[Sshagradstudents] welcome back, save the date, and invitation to nominate our Common Read book for Merced County by Sept. 10

[UCM Center for the Humanities]

Sent on behalf of Ignacio López-Calvo, Director of the Center for the Humanities

Dear Colleagues,

Welcome back for the fall semester! We wanted to share a quick overview of upcoming activities in our Center. Our annual call for grant applications will go out this fall, likely in October.  We invite you to nominate a "Common Read" book<https://centerforhumanities.ucmerced.edu/form/nominations-merced-county-common-read-book> for Merced County by Sept. 10; this is a Mellon-funded program we have in collaboration with the Merced County Library, which will occur in spring.  Please save the date for some of the following upcoming events, which include our brownbag talks, public humanities lectures, humanities seminars, and workshops; a few more are still being confirmed and will be announced soon. We will be continuing to host weekly writing groups in our lab space (COB2-295B): for faculty on Thursday mornings and for graduate students on Monday mornings, from 9-12, starting Sept. 4.

This past summer, Professors Patricia Vergara and Nigel Hatton have led our Mellon-funded public humanities projects, each with teams of four graduate students, focused on engaging our local communities through humanities research. They will be launching public programming this fall as well, including an exhibit, a performance, a symposium, and an archive on Calisphere. Their respective projects are "Soundscapes of Merced" and "Prisons, Universities, and the Public."  Please watch for future announcements related to their public programs.

Date
Time
Location
Event Type
Title
Speaker
Thursday, September 4, 2025
2:00 PM
COB2-295
Capacity-Building Workshop
Making Videos to Showcase Your Research: Create, Edit, Share
Man Zhang, Staff Research Associate, Center for the Humanities, UC Merced
Thursday, September 18, 2025
2:00 PM
COB2-295
Mellon Public Humanities Speaker Series
Public Humanities as Micro Joy: Building Human Connections in Tumultuous Times
Erica Kohl-Arenas, Director of Imagining America, Associate Professor of American Studies, UC Davis
Friday, September 26, 2025
7:00 PM
El Capitan Courtyard
Co-Sponsored Public Humanities Event
Merced’s 2nd Annual LitFest: Hope & Hard Times, Keynote Reading
Lori Ostlund
Saturday, September 27, 2025
12:00 PM - 5:00 PM
Downtown Merced
Co-Sponsored Public Humanities Event
Merced’s 2nd Annual LitFest: Hope & Hard Times
 Multiple Authors
Saturday, September 27, 2025
10 a.m.-12 p.m.
Merced County Library
Public Humanities Event
Local Author Fair
Multiple Local Authors Tabling
Monday, October 13
12:30 PM
COB2-295
Brownbag Talk
Entangled Communities: Immigration Routes Across the Ancient Andes
Beth K. Scaffidi, Assistant Professor, AHS and Director, Skeletal & Environmental Isotope (SEIL) Laboratory, UC Merced
Thursday, October 23, 2025
4:30 PM
COB2-295
Mellon Public Humanities Speaker Series
Philosophy That Tells a Story: How I Craft an Episode of Hi-Phi Nation
Barry Lam, Professor of Philosophy, UC Riverside
TBD - likely October or November
TBD
COB2-295
Mass Media Training
How to Talk to Journalists – What Academics and Educational Professionals Should Know
Brianna Vaccari, Editor, The Merced FOCUS
TBD - likely October or November
TBD
COB2-295
Mass Media Training
Journalism in the Age of Trump: How Academics and Journalists Share Common Ground in Speaking Truth to Power
Joe Kieta, Executive Editor, Central Valley Journalism Collaborative
Victor Patton,  Managing Editor, Central Valley Journalism Collaborative
Thursday, November 6, 2025
2:00 PM
COB2-295
Merced Seminar in the Humanities
Where Do Pandemics Come From? Using Black Death Narratives to Rethink the Origin of Pandemics
Monica Green, Independent Scholar
Anticipated: week of November 10
TBD
TBD
Symposium

organized by Nigel Hatton
TBD - likely October or November
TBD
COB2-295
Mass Media Training
The State of Local Journalism in the Valley: What Happened and How It Can Make a Comeback
Joe Kieta, Executive Editor, Central Valley Journalism Collaborative
Victor Patton, Managing Editor, Central Valley Journalism Collaborative
Thursday, November 20
TBD
Merced Courthouse Museum
Soundscapes of Merced Exhibit and Performance

organized by Patricia Vergara
Monday, December 1, 2025
12:30 PM
COB2-295
Brownbag Talk
Graduate Employment Outcomes in Academic Philosophy 2014-2024
Carolyn Jennings, Professor of Philosophy, UC Merced


We look forward to seeing you at some of these events and to being in community,

Ignacio López-Calvo
Director, Center for the Humanities
UC Merced





[cid:333f9e5b-e68c-40a3-b4ba-91ab91247213]

UC Merced Center for the Humanities

humanities at ucmerced.edu

209-228-2453

Follow us on Facebook<https://www.facebook.com/CenterForTheHumanitiesUCMerced> and Twitter<https://twitter.com/UCMercedCFH> for the latest updates.

Visit our website<http://crha.ucmerced.edu/> for funding opportunities, research groups, and upcoming events.
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.ucmerced.edu/pipermail/sshagradstudents/attachments/20250825/f44fd6cf/attachment-0001.htm>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: image.png
Type: image/png
Size: 18172 bytes
Desc: image.png
URL: <http://lists.ucmerced.edu/pipermail/sshagradstudents/attachments/20250825/f44fd6cf/attachment-0001.png>