Center News

HTC Director Nick Bates Featured on Center Podcast

Managing Director Kurt Cavender welcomes Director of the Howard Thurman Center, Nick Bates, to discuss Thurman’s legacy and relevance to navigating the world today. Nick is a Thurman scholar dedicated to finding ways to help the community develop a relationship with Thurman’s work. Listen to the episode here.

Chika Okeke-Agulu Delivers Spring Lecture in Criticism

The Center welcomed Robert Schirmer Professor of Art and Archaeology and African American Studies Chika Okeke-Agulu on March 20 for its spring Lecture in Criticism. His books include El Anatsui. The Reinvention of Sculpture (Damiani, 2022); African Artists: From 1882 to Now (Phaidon, 2021); Yusuf Grillo: Painting. Lagos. Life (Skira, 2020); Obiora Udechukwu: Line, Image, […]

Support the National Endowment for the Humanities

The BU Center for the Humanities traces its founding to a matching grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH), a vital national resource. Recently, the NEH has terminated hundreds of grants that support scholars, cultural organizations, and humanities councils in every state and enacted significant reductions in force of the NEH staff. The […]

Humanists at Work: Margaret Litvin, Associate Professor of Arabic & Comparative Literature

Although Margaret Litvin went to graduate school to study Arabic, she didn’t expect she would end up as a professor. Now an Associate Professor of Arabic and Comparative Literature at Boston University, Litvin spent her undergraduate years focused on breaking into a different field: journalism. “I worked a lot on my college newspaper, probably more […]

Center Staff Joins National Humanities Advocacy Day

The Center is dedicated to humanities advocacy. Center Managing Director Kurt Cavender, PhD and student staff member Leilani Muchai joined other representatives from across Massachusetts at National Humanities Advocacy Day on Capitol Hill. this team met with Massachusetts congressional representatives and staffers to speak to the importance of continued support for the National Endowment for […]

Center Hosts Annual Humanities Book Publication Celebration

Faculty and their guests gathered to celebrate another year of humanistic publications at the Center’s annual book celebration on February 27, 2025. Center Director Juliet Floyd highlighted 21 works by faculty and staff, including the Center Managing Director Kurt Cavender. The publications ranged from book projects—some built off over ten years of research and writing—to […]

Anthony Petro Featured on Center Podcast

Center staff member Roni Lakin (CAS ’25) sat down with Associate Professor of Religion Anthony Petro to discuss Petro’s forthcoming book, Provoking Religion: Sex, Art, and the Culture Wars, which he completed during his time as a Jeffrey Henderson Senior Research Fellow. Tune in as they discuss protest art, ACT UP, and the strong reactions late […]