FY24 Report
2023-2024 Year in Review
From the Director
This has been a momentous time for the UT Humanities Center—now the Denbo Center for Humanities & the Arts! We are thrilled that our name now reflects the generosity of alumnus Don Denbo, always a dedicated supporter of the liberal and creative arts whose life exemplifies how the humanities can connect to all fields of endeavor and who models a vibrant life of learning. We also have moved into a wonderful suite in historical Cherokee Mills on Sutherland Avenue, a space suited to public programming and to growing the DCHA into a nationally recognized humanities institute.
We had a banner year in terms of programming! In fall term, One Health and Humanities Days included twelve events by faculty from ten different departments over the course of three days—a cornucopia of programming that was free and open to the public and that also was a fabulous collaboration between the Denbo Center and the UT system’s One Health Initiative led by Deb Miller (professor of wildlife pathology at UTIA). We hosted a graduate-student-led research symposium by students in World Languages and Cultures, a special afternoon event for faculty about building interdisciplinary research centers, and a reception for graduate students in the Digital Humanities Certificate Program. Our Denbo Center graduate research assistant, Michael Sutherlin, created new programming for graduate students, and we awarded nearly $21,000 to graduate students for research travel and symposia. Through the spring term, we also hosted our first Visiting Fulbright Scholar, Professor Mari Hatavara from Finland, and learned from her groundbreaking work in narrative theory as well as her collaborative work with Professor Lo Presser in Sociology.
You can read about more of our activities in this report, but we want to say “thank you” for your support of the Denbo Center: we are proud to be active Volunteers and to advocate for arts and humanities work in the state of Tennessee. In these polarized times, when people are increasingly siloed and suspicious of difference, we have forged interdisciplinary collaborations within the College of Arts and Sciences as well as across the university, the state, and the nation. As Ai grows ever stronger, and as global politics become increasingly brutalizing, we continue to work to create hospitable and diverse communities of dialogue and care as we support research excellence. We are proud to enter our next stage of development as a research institute, and very much look forward to talking with you at our new location this year!
Amy J. Elias
Director, Denbo Center for Humanities & the Arts
A Lifelong Commitment to the Arts & Humanities
The University of Tennessee, Knoxville, celebrated the naming of the Denbo Center for Humanities & the Arts on April 2, 2024. The center is named for alumnus Don Denbo, a former Vol football star, who is dedicated to promoting an education grounded in the humanities.
Pictured: Cutting the ribbon at the Denbo Center’s naming ceremony in April 2024
“I came to Tennessee to play football! What I found, however, as a consequence of truly wonderful professors, opened my eyes to the wonder of learning and the value of all the humanities classes I took… All of these people opened my mind to all forms of human expression: the mind, the written and spoken word, and, most importantly, the expression of art in its many and inexhaustible forms. These studies framed my life and endowed me with a deep commitment to see that other people could learn to rejoice in these studies as I had.”
– Don Denbo ‘71
Pictured: The atrium outside of the Denbo Center’s suite in Cherokee Mills
A New Name, A New Home
In early January 2024, we moved out of Dunford Hall, where the UT Humanities Center had been housed since Fall 2019, and into a newly-renovated suite at Cherokee Mills, located in Knoxville’s historic Marble City neighborhood. Our beautiful new space offers an exciting array of possibilities for future arts and humanities programming.
Special thanks to Barbara Tallent and the teams at UT Facilities Services and the Office of Innovative Technology (OIT) for helping to turn the vision into reality!
Pictured: UT celebrity animals Smokey I and Sinan the Squirrel endorse One Health + Humanities Days.
One Health + Humanities Days: Arts + Humanities Interventions
Equine history. Cinematic dance. Moroccan archaeology. Mental health. What do these topics have in common? They were just a few of the subjects explored during One Health + Humanities Days (OHHD), a collaborative partnership between the Denbo Center (then the UT Humanities Center) and the UT One Health Initiative (OHI). OHHD showcased the critical role that arts and humanities play in understanding and exploring sustainability and global wellbeing, including human, animal, plant, and environmental health.
Denbo Center hosts Mari Hatavara, its first Fulbright Fellow-in-Residence
Mari Hatavara is Chair Professor of Finnish Literature and director of Narrare: Centre for Interdisciplinary Narrative Studies at Tampere University in Finland. Hatavara was invited to Knoxville by Denbo Center Director Amy Elias, a fellow specialist in narrative studies, and by Lois Presser, a professor of sociology and Distinguished Professor in the Humanities at UT. Hatavara was in residence at the Denbo Center for five months, from January through May 2024.
2023-2024 Denbo Center Faculty & Graduate Student Fellows
With the support of the UT Chancellor’s Office, the Office of Research and Engagement, our affiliated arts and humanities departments, and the College of Arts and Sciences, the Denbo Center supports the creation of groundbreaking humanities research through our fellowship programs. These individuals include our Faculty Research Fellows, a Digital Humanities Faculty Fellow, Graduate Research Fellows, and the affiliated Marco Haslam Dissertation Fellow.
About our 2023-2024 Faculty Fellows
Gosia Citko-DuPlantis, World Langauges & Cultures
Embracing Instability: Imagining “Man’yoshū” in Medieval and Modern Japan
Shaneda Destine, Sociology & Africana Studies
Cuffy Witsell and Black Rural Resistance Rearticulated in Colleton County, South Carolina’s Round O Plantation
Georgi Gardiner, Philosophy
She Said, He Said
Hilary Havens, English
The Cambridge Edition of Frances Burney’s Cecilia
DeLisa Hawkes, Africana Studies
Separate Yet Intertwined: Rediscovering Black Indigeneity in the New Negro Renaissance
Eleni Palis, English, Cinema Studies
A Cinema of Reparations: Contemporary American Media and the Reparative Mode
Thorsten Huth (Digital Humanities Fellow), World Languages & Cultures, English
Building the Digital Platform “Interaction in Second Language Studies”
About our 2023-2024 Graduate Fellows
Henry Kirby, English
Unsettling Laughter: The Humor of Nineteenth-Century Native Literature
Casey Price, History
Given to This Land: Mapping Settler Colonialism in the Cherokee Homelands
Kelly Sauskojus, English
Grantwriting Ecologies in East Knoxville Urban Agriculture Nonprofits
Kaitlin Simpson, History
The Flowers of El Dorado: Gender, Production, and the Cut Flower Industry in Colombia and the United States
Matthew Baker (Marco Institute Haslam Dissertation Fellow), History
The World of Lérins: A Late Antique Monastic Ontology
Michael Sutherlin: 2023-24 Denbo Center Graduate Research Assistant
“It’s hard to communicate how much of a blessing my experience at the Humanities Center—now the Denbo Center—has been to me. I’ve learned so much just by attending many highly engaging events and working with the various scholars.”
– Michael Sutherlin, PhD ‘24
Read Michael’s reflections on his time at the Denbo Center
As part of his assistantship, Michael planned and led two special events at the Denbo Center for UT arts and humanities graduate students. Read about them in the drop-down sections below.
Arts & Humanities Trivia Night
Open to students in UT’s arts & humanities graduate programs, the Denbo Center’s first-ever trivia night (pictured at left) was a success! The VolShop generously provided prizes for the participants.
Alt-Ac Career Panel Luncheon
Alt-Ac Career Panel Luncheon
Arts & humanities graduate students were invited to have lunch and hear from a panel of former humanities grads working at UT who have found enriching alt-ac careers. The panelists spoke about their own experiences going from graduate school in the humanities to finding work in a range of different jobs. They addressed practical elements of searching for alt-ac jobs, such as the differences between CVs and resumes and the various available job search platforms, and spoke about the kinds of tasks that they perform in their roles on campus. They also discussed the emotional and personal sides of making a transition into an alt-ac career. Attendees praised it one of the best and most useful career events they have been to.
Panelists:
- Katie Hodges-Kluck (PhD, MA History) — Communications & Marketing Coordinator, Denbo Center
- Chris Kilgore (PhD English, MFA Creative Writing) — Associate Director for the Scholarship of Teaching & Learning
- Hannah Schmidt (MA Art History) — Research Development Manager in the Office of Research, Innovation, and Economic Development (ORIED)
- Lauren Whitnah (PhD Medieval Studies) — Research Manager and Associate Director at the Global Computing Laboratory (GCLab)
Michael successfully defended his dissertation in July 2024. Thanks to connections that he made while organizing the DCHA’s alt-ac career panel (see above), he started a new job as a research manager at UT’s Global Computing Laboratory. We wish him luck with this exciting opportunity to put his humanistic training to use in new ways!
Write on Site: Supporting faculty & graduate student research
This year we revived our Write on Site program, which had been on hiatus for several years on account of the coronavirus pandemic. Every week, we open the Denbo Center to UT arts and humanities faculty and graduate students who wish to devote time to a writing project. Those attendees seeking a quiet place to work on articles, book projects, or dissertations can find a comfortable spot in our reading room, while those who prefer to write in a more café-style environment appreciate the ambience of our welcoming reception space.
Write on Site provides a supportive space in which arts and humanities faculty and graduate students can make important progess on their major research projects. The program also fosters community and allows faculty and students to get to better know their colleagues, receive feedback on sticky writing challenges, and build collaborative partnerships with one another.
FY24 Faculty Manuscript Review Workshops
Małgorzata Citko-DuPlantis (World Languages & Cultures) — Embracing Instability: Imagining ‘man yoshu’ in Medieval and Modern Japan — Reviewers: Torquil Duthie (UCLA); Christina Laffin (University of British Columbia)
Katherine Chiles (English) — Critical Race Theory and Early American Literary Studies — Reviewers: Kelly Wisecup (Northwestern University), Joe Rezek (Boston University)
$13,000 in Departmental Sponsorships
Special Events: NEXUS Graduate Symposium (English) • 5th Annual Vernacular Symposium (World Languages & Cultures) • Philosophy Graduate Student Association Conference on “Emerging Technologies & Social Ethics • Frederick Douglass Day • 12th Annual Tennessee Undergraduate Classics Research Conference
Visiting Speakers: Sarah Tlili (Religious Studies Siddiqi Lecture) • Juan Diego Diaz, Lucy Caldwell, Deirdre Cooper Owens • Visiting Actors: Roger Clark, Rob Wietoff
Faculty Conference & Symposia Grants
In FY24, the Denbo Center awarded competitive grants to three faculty members from UT’s arts and humanities departments in support of collaborative conferences or symposia-style events expanding humanistic research on the UT Knoxville campus. Faculty were invited to apply for up to $4,000 in funding, with priority given to multi-disciplinary projects. Applicants also were required to apply for at least one additional funding source, preferably from an external (non-UT) sponsor.
The awardees were:
- Georgi Gardiner (Philosophy) for “Reflections: The Epistemology of Life Experiences Workshop”
- Andrew Sigler (College of Music) to host the MUTED musical project by pianist Eunmi Ko in collaboration with composers Anruo Cheng and Ania Vu
- Aleydis Van de Moortel (Classics) and Luis Cano (World Languages & Cultures) to host the 2024 “Translations” conference
- Suzanne Wright (School of Art) to host the fifth annual Southeast US Scholars and Friends of Late Imperial China (SEUSS-FLIC) Conference on “Family, Friendship, and Community”
2023-24 Research Seminars
The Denbo Center’s research seminars are year-long interdisciplinary discussion groups organized around compelling areas of intellectual inquiry. Convened by at least two tenure-stream UT faculty members, research seminars identify and explore a central question leading to a projected research outcome, such as a conference, book publication, research cluster at the university level, or grant application. In FY24, the Denbo Center funded each research seminar with $3,000 to help support the purchase of books, honoraria for guest speakers, and other relevant activities.
Documenting the Impact of the Humanities in Higher Education
During the 2023-24 academic year, DCHA Director Amy Elias and Communications Coordinator Katie Hodges-Kluck participated in a new online professional development course offered by the National Humanities Alliance on documenting the impact of the humanities in higher education. The course consisted of five workshops (with an optional sixth course that Hodges-Kluck also attended) on research methodologies, approaches to analyzing and leveraging data, and impact as it relates to a variety of higher ed contexts, such as humanities centers and the public humanities.
2024 Digital Humanities Summer Institute
The Denbo Center, in partnership with the Digital Humanities Summer Institute (DHSI) and UT Libraries, provided funding for four UT faculty and one UT graduate student to attend the 2024 DHSI at the University of Victoria in British Columbia. The DHSI is an annual digital scholarship training institute that brings together an international cohort of 800-900 participants from across the arts, humanities, library, and archives communities. The program consists of two sets of week-long intensive course offerings, seminars, and lectures focused on helping participants develop expertise in advanced technologies as well as current digital humanities methodologies and ideas.
This is the second year that the DCHA has provided this opportunity for UT participants. Applications were judged based on the relevance of the applicants’ research and teaching to the field of digital humanities, the fit of the DHSI courses they planned to attend, and how the applicants’ work contributes to the Denbo Center and to the digital humanities community of scholars at UT. This year’s recipients of DHSI funding were:
- Mark Baggett, Associate Professor, UT Libraries
- Heather Coker Hawkins, Assistant Professor, School of Art
- Lisa King, Associate Professor, Department of English
- Enilda Romero-Hall, Associate Professor, College of Education, Health, and Human Sciences
- Hannah Trammel, MA student, Department of English
2023 Graduate Student Summer Travel Grant Recipients
- Matthew Baker (History) — “The World of Lérins: A Late Antique Monastic Ontology” — Research trip to France
- Jane Chang (History) — “Intermingling of the Old and New: The Formation of a New German-American Medical Culture in Colonial Pennsylvania (1730-1780) — Research trip to Pennsylvania
- Matthew Kelley (History) — “German Agitation in Swiss Civil Society during the Great War: Nationalism, Internationalism, and the Struggle for Neutrality” — Research trip to Switzerland
- Amanda Klug (History) — “Memories of the United States Constitutional Convention” — Research trip to Pennsylvania
- Thomas Maurer (History) — “In that Day, the Dragon will approach the City: Italy and the Apocalyptic Dream” — Research trip to France and England
- Kelly Sauskojus (English) — “Grantwriting Ecologies at East Knoxville Urban Agriculture Nonprofits” — Research trip to Louisiana
- Kaitlin Simpson (History) — The Flowers of El Dorado: Gender, Production, and the Cut Flower Industry in Colombia and the United States” — Research trip to Colombia
- Jason Stubblefield (History) — History as a Religious Category in the Writings of William of Malmesbury” — Research trip to England
$13,375 raised in one day during Big Orange Give 2023 to support the Denbo Center and its programs, including generous matching gifts from two anonymous donors.
2023-2024 Programming
Click on a title to see details about the program.
Distinguished Lecture Series
Our Distinguished Lecture Series brings acclaimed humanities scholars and renowned artists to Knoxville and connects UT arts and humanities faculty to the best researchers in their fields.
Joseph Campana, Rice University
Thinking with Bees
Julian C. Chambliss, Michigan State University
Afrofuturism and Digital Humanities*
Xiaofei Kang, George Washington University
Mobilizing Ghosts for the Revolution
Kathleen Fitzpatrick, Michigan State University
Open Infrastructure and the Future of Knowledge Production*
Leonora Neville, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Political Religion in the Long Roman Empire
Mari Hatavara, Tampere University, Finland | DCHA Fulbright Fellow-in-Residence
Computational Recognition of Narratives*
Ardis Butterfield, Yale University
Reading Medieval Song
Erin McGlothlin, Washington University in St. Louis
Imagining Operation Reinhard in Contemporary Holocaust Fiction
Lauren Klein, Emory University
A Counterhistory of Data Visualization*
*Part of our Dialogues mini-series in digital humanities
Conversations & Cocktails
Conversations & Cocktails is a free public lecture and discussion series that showcases the original research of our distinguished UT arts and humanities faculty.
Eleni Palis (English, Cinema Studies) — The Reparative Remake in Contemporary American Cinema
Ernest Freeberg (History) — Inventing Our Golden Years
Justin Arft (Classics) — The Hidden Dimensions of Greek Heroes and Myth
Daniel Magilow (World Languages & Cultures) — How the Nazis Made Disinformation Appealing
Kelli Wood (School of Art) — Renaissance Sport: An Athletic Art
Big Hairy Grants Faculty Development Workshop Series
Big Hairy Grants is a workshop series started in 2022 for UT arts and humanities faculty who find grants to be somewhere on a spectrum from irrelevant to terrifying. Through informal presentations and open conversations, faculty learn to navigate the often bewildering and intimidating, sometimes bureaucratic, but ultimately rewarding world of grants.
Why Bother Applying for Grants?
Presenters: Amy Elias (Denbo Center), Hannah Schmidt (Office of Research, Innovation, and Economic Development)
What Exactly is a Sponsored Grant?
Presenters: Hannah Schmidt, Jill Passano (Corporate and Foundation Engagement), Sally Morris (Corporate and Foundation Engagement), Urmila Seshagiri (Department of English)
What on Earth Does That Term Mean?
Presenters: David Smelser (Preaward Operations), Drew Haswell (College of Arts & Sciences)
How to Make Connections in the Community
Presenters: Misty Anderson (Department of English), Hana Sherman (Clarence Brown Theatre), Pat Rutenberg (Department of History), Javiette Samuel (Associate Vice Chancellor and Director of Community Engagement and Outreach)
How to Build an Interdisciplinary Team
Presenters: Brad Day (Associate Vice Chancellor for Research & Innovation Initiatives), Mingzhou Jin (Industrial & Systems Engineering), Chien-fei Chen (CURENT and Electrical Engineering & Computer Science), Amy Elias
How to Write a Grant Proposal
Presenter: Hannah Schmidt
2023-2024 Faculty Steering Committee
The Steering Committee of the Denbo Center for Humanities & the Arts (DCHA) is the central faculty advisory board reporting to the Director of the Center. It formulates policy advisory to the Director, addresses issues of funding, and may oversee or approve the decisions of other committees. The Steering Committee also advises the Director on establishing priorities for how the DCHA can best serve the university and community. Membership appointments are for tenured or tenure-stream research faculty who will serve a term of two academic calendar years.
Justin Arft
Department of Classics
Nathan Fleschner
Natalie L. Haslam College of Music
Brittany Murray
Department of World Languages & Cultures
Larry Perry
Department of Religious Studies
Lisi Schoenbach
Department of English
Mariam Thalos
Department of Philosophy
Felege-Selam Yirga
Department of History
UT Supporters
We are grateful to the UT administrators who support the our arts & humanities work.
College of Arts & Sciences
R. J. Hinde, Executive Dean
Beauvais Lyons, Dean of Arts & Humanities
Michael Blum, Associate Dean of Research & Creative Activity
Office of the Provost
John Zomchick, Provost & Senior Vice Chancellor
Office of Research, Innovation, and Economic Development (ORIED)
Deb Crawford, Vice Chancellor for Research, Innovation, and Economic Development
UT Libraries
Steve Escar Smith, Dean
Affiliated UT Arts & Humanities Departments/Colleges
Other UT Partners
The Denbo Center works closely with a number of different units around campus.
International, National, & Regional Partnerships & Affiliations
The Denbo Center’s affiliations to other institutions for the humanities and arts provide valuable partnerships and opportunities for our faculty and graduate students.
Consortium of Humanities Centers and Institutes (CHCI)
Humanities Tennessee (director on advisory board)
2023-2024 DCHA Board of Friends
Our Board of Friends supports the Denbo Center by providing advice, advocacy, service, and contributions in support of the Center’s mission, programs, and administration.
The Board usually meets quarterly. Board of Friends members serve for a renewable 3-year term and are actively engaged in promoting the mission and vision of the Center, supporting the Center’s funding priorities, advocating for the Denbo Center with key stakeholders, and recruiting new Board members. Distinguished professionals from a variety of backgrounds and including diverse perspectives are invited to serve.
We are so grateful to these partners for their support of the Denbo Center and for their commitment to the arts and humanities at UT and throughout our community!
How Can I Get Involved?
If you are someone who believes passionately in the value of arts and humanities research to education, to social discourse, to creative innovation in a global environment, and to sustained and rich dialogue between cultures and societies, consider one of the many ways that you can support us and participate in our programming!
Consider making a gift memorializing your family or an imporant person in your life through a named program such as our Distinguished Lecture Series or a named graduate student research fellowship.
Help us to build our endowments so that we can grow our programming for UT faculty, graduate and undergraduate students, and for members of the public. There is a link at our website (humanitiescenter.utk.edu/giving) that allows you to give online—or just call us, and we can take your information via phone.
Support our annual “Big Orange Give” day in November with your monetary gifts or your time. Visit our Facebook page for videos of some of our past Big Orange Give Zoomathon conversations and talks!
Connect the Denbo Center with your organization if its work is related to the mission of the DCHA in some way. We are always looking for public collaborations!
Jered Sprecher: Exploring Humanity through Art
“My work shows images that are revealed as fragments in the midst of change, destruction, redefinition, and restoration,” says Jered Sprecher, a professor in UT’s School of Art. Sprecher uses visual language to “describe that which humanity has in common, be it humor, mortality, or yearning to understand what is beyond.” The Denbo Center is thrilled to feature Sprecher’s work as the first art exhibition in our new space.
Pictured: Jered and Christine Sprecher unpack and hang Jered’s paintings in the Denbo Center
Quantum Canvases: Exploring the Arts & Humanities through Physics
In October of 2023, the Denbo Center collaborated with the UT Department of Physics and Astronomy and staff from the Geneva-based European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) to host a series of public events exploring the intersection between physics, the arts, and the humanities.
“While others are scaling back, we are investing in the humanities and creative work…
– Donde Plowman, Chancellor
The humanities and the arts are an increasingly valuable part of our interdisciplinary programs and curriculum. They help our students to be well-rounded citizens.”