This year, NC Humanities awarded grants to 21 public humanities projects, including four involving faculty in the College of Arts and Sciences.
North Carolina Humanities recently announced the recipients of its annual Large Project Grants. This year, the organization awarded a total of $378,949 to 21 public humanities projects, including four involving College of Arts and Sciences faculty. The projects are designed to uplift and uncover stories, cultures and histories of North Carolinians both past and present.
Among the recipients are projects ranging from a series of interactive workshops focused on Indigenous authors, artists, scholars and chefs to oral history collection from African American residents of Washington and the Hispanic community of Charlotte to films and walking tours about Western North Carolina. Each of the awarded projects reflects a commitment to community engagement, cultural preservation, dialogue and education.
The following award-winning projects involve departments, centers and people in the College of Arts and Sciences:
Medicine, Food, and Domestic Life in Regency England and Colonial North Carolina
Grant Award: $20,000
In many ways, Austen’s 1813 “Sense and Sensibility” acts as a bridge between 18th and 19th century moral aesthetics. As such, this grant will support plenaries, workshops, discussions and readings that will explore domesticity, medicine and military conflict in colonial North Carolina and Austen’s world. Many of these activities will take place at Tryon Palace in New Bern, North Carolina. This unique location will invite visitors to consider the tensions rooted in class, national identity and religion felt between North Carolina settlers and their British colonial rulers. Such tensions inform and parallel Austen’s historical moment and the conflicts in her writing. New Bern’s coastal location opens further opportunities for exploring the slave trade and piracy.
Celebrating and Reflecting on 50 Years of Women’s and Gender Studies in North Carolina
Grant Award: $20,000
This grant will support a series of events, workshops and public performances throughout the 2025-2026 academic year to coincide with the 50th anniversary of the department of women and gender studies at UNC-Chapel Hill. Engaging public audiences and humanities experts alike, this diverse set of events will explore the histories, legacies and challenges of women’s and gender studies, reflecting upon where the field has come from and where it is headed. Events will call attention to the deep roots of women’s and gender studies in the state and the continued significance of research, teaching, advocacy and ongoing dialogue.
Celebrating Diversity: Combatting Refugee Isolation Through Cross-Cultural Storytelling
Grant Award: $14,858
This project seeks to address the issue of cultural isolation and language barriers for Middle Eastern and Muslim refugees in the Triangle area. Journal articles and professionals in organizations that support refugees claim the primary focus of support is on the economic needs of their clients and the resettlement process is devoid of cultural interventions. Through this 12-month series of field trips to cultural heritage institutions and local historical sites, participants will encounter local North Carolina culture and heritage to increase their understanding of their new home’s traditions and grow their sense of belonging. Each field excursion will include on-site translation and a bilingual handout/booklet to help increase language exposure and give participants something to revisit. These activities will reinforce a sense of pride in their own culture and help them feel welcomed and valued in North Carolina.
Legacies of Lynching: An Inaugural Gathering
Grant Award: $20,000
The Equal Justice Initiative has documented over 4,000 lynchings of Black Americans that occurred between the close of Reconstruction and 1950. EJI identified 55 county sites of lynching in North Carolina. Following the work of EJI, 10 North Carolina county-based coalitions from Alamance, Buncombe, Chatham, Guilford, Mecklenburg, Orange, New Hanover, Rowan, Wake and Warren Counties have taken significant steps toward documenting lynchings in their local communities and honoring their victims. As such, this grant will help support a gathering of leaders, university scholars, undergraduate students and lifelong learners for a first-of-its-kind statewide convening to discuss and learn about the history of racial injustice, lynching and descendant community-led public history work.
Through public humanities programs and grantmaking, North Carolina Humanities connects North Carolinians with cultural experiences that spur dialogue, deepen human connections and inspire community. North Carolina Humanities is a statewide nonprofit and affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Click here to learn more about all of the projects.