Mellon Foundation adds $1 million to public humanities partnership

The Willson Center for Humanities and Arts has received a $1 million grant from the Mellon Foundation for a second phase of its public humanities partnership with the historic Penn Center on St. Helena Island, South Carolina. The grant-funded project, Culture and Community at the Penn Center National Historic Landmark District, launched in 2021 with an initial $1 million award from Mellon to build and implement programs in collaboration with the Penn Center and surrounding Sea Islands communities in the Gullah Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor:

“As Kendrick Lamar and SZA say, ‘All the stars are closer,’” said Barbara McCaskill, Distinguished Research Professor of English and associate academic director of the Willson Center. “This collaboration has enabled students to learn how the history and culture of Gullah Geechee communities, which trace to West Africa, can inform how we may collectively resolve national concerns from climate change to land preservation.”

Program activities for the Culture and Community partnership began in 2022 with annual artists-in-residence and community fellows, twice-yearly community conversations, and summer student research residencies that bring scholars and faculty from academic institutions including UGA, Georgia Tech, Emory University, Howard University, Spelman College, Morehouse College, the University of Michigan, and the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill.

“This funding will take the Willson Center past a decade of continuous funding from the Mellon Foundation,” said Nicholas Allen, Baldwin Professor in Humanities and director of the Willson Center. “We’re all proud of that recognition and recognize the responsibility we have to work through the humanities and arts to build curiosity, inclusivity, and opportunity.”

The project’s next phase will continue to deepen and evolve its programs, with a view toward building greater collective capacity and bolstering its future sustainability. Angela Dore, who has coordinated the project’s activities at Penn Center since the partnership’s inception, will continue and expand upon her role. The grant’s principal investigators are Allen and McCaskill, in collaboration with Valerie Babb, Andrew W. Mellon Professor of Humanities at Emory University.

“Especially in difficult times, programs like this remind us that our histories are shared. When we remember this, we remember our humanity,” Babb said.

Congratulations to our Willson Center and Emory University colleagues on the momentous support to extend the reach of the Penn Center. A vision for the humanities enriches everyone and everything it touches.