an image of a building with a clock on the top of it

Winter 2016

All Colloquia will take place in JFSB 4010 at 3:00pm unless otherwise specified. January 14 Jeremy Browne (Digital Humanities) & Matt Wickman (Humanities Center Director, English) What are the public humanities? No, really, what are they? January 21 James Swensen (Art History) Place and the Photographic Medium February 4 Sergio Waisman (Spanish and International Affairs; …

JFSB fountain in the fall

Fall 2018

All Colloquia will take place in JFSB 4010 at 3:00pm unless otherwise specified. ​​ September 13 Marianne Hirsch (Columbia University) “Women Mobilizing Memory” October 4 Digital Humanities Roundtable Discussion   October 11 James Krause & Faith Blackhurst (Spanish & Portuguese) Moving Beyond Foreignization: Ángel Crespo’s Spanish Translation of Grande: sertão Veredas, by João Guimarães Rosa November …

an image of a group of people standing in front of a book shelf

2018

  The Humanities Center in coordination with BYU’s Office of Research and Creative Activities (ORCA) will hold its annual ORCA Symposium on Friday, October 26th at 3:00 PM in 4010 JFSB. Blake Perry Smith – Open Source Consistency Evaluation for Chinese Word Segmentation Chinese in its written form does not separate its characters by spaces. Imagine …

an image of a building with a clock on the front of it

Winter 2019

All Colloquia will take place in JFSB 4010 at 3:00 PM unless otherwise specified. ​​ January 17 Marlene Esplin, Rex Nielsen, & Jamin Rowan Scholarship & Activism Roundtable January 24 Rico Vitz (Azusa Pacific University) Mencius, Hume, and the Virtue of Humanity: A Comparative Analysis of Benevolent Moral Development January 31 Kirk Belnap (Asian & Near Eastern …

A set of stairs in a museum with statues on either side and one statue at the top, all life-sized

On Deserve

This essay was written by Aiden Jones, a BYU Humanities Center student fellow. I don’t know that I’ve ever been able to use words to communicate as well as Helen Burns, whose “soul sat on her lips, and language flowed” as she spoke to her friend Jane Eyre. [1] Today, language, like almost everything else …

a brown envelope with a blank piece of white paper and a green plant

Letters to Rilke

This essay was written by Julia Morgan, a BYU Humanities Center student fellow.   Dear Rilke,         I know you were born in 1875, and that you didn’t write Letters to a Young Poet to me. But I’m in need of some counsel, and, as I am a Young Poet as well, …

Annual Symposium: “Touch: Sensation, Embodiment, Relation”

Call for Papers BYU Humanities Center Annual Symposium, Fall 2026 “Touch: Sensation, Embodiment, Relation” The sensation of touch is produced by one of the most complex systems in the human body. Current neuroscience research, for example, estimates that the human hand alone contains roughly 17,000 mechanoreceptors—bundles of cells, nerves, and sensory units—that relay myriad stimuli …

A pile of scrabble tiles, some displaying letters

Every Nation, and Kindred, and Tongue, and People

This essay was written by Chris Rogers, a BYU Humanities Center faculty fellow. I think, write, and teach about language diversity a lot. In my classes students are asked to analyze the similarities and differences between languages from all over the world, how they have independently developed, and what they uniquely represent for the people …

A tempest at sea

No More, God

This essay was written by George Dibble, a BYU Humanities Center student fellow. Alone in my room, I listened to a neuroscientist (Caroline Leaf) talk about the 21st century’s rise in preventable deaths. She talked about surging anxiety, depression rates, and especially of my generation (Gen Z). Gallup reports that 47.8 million Americans are diagnosed …

Pond picture with tree - site banner announcing the deadline for the faculty writing retreat

Faculty Writing Retreat 2026

Call for Applications: BYU Humanities Center Summer Writing Retreat 2026 Deadline: 14 March 2026 Inspired by the productive example of the National Humanities Center, we are pleased to announce that the BYU Humanities Center will sponsor a Summer Writing Retreat in June 22 – 27, 2026. This retreat will provide you with space and time …