Grant Announcement

Dr. Krista Sue-Lo Twu (Department of English, Linguistics & Writing Studies; College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences; University of Minnesota Duluth), Dr. Gilbert Tostevin (Department of Anthropology: College of Liberal Arts; University of Minnesota Twin Cities), and Dr. Lydia Garver (Associate Director, Center for Premodern Studies; College of Liberal Arts; University of Minnesota Twin Cities) have been awarded an Institute for Advanced Study grant. Per the website, an IAS grant is awarded to those who will “...assemble a group of scientists and scholars who with their pupils and assistants may devote themselves to the task of pushing beyond the present limits of human knowledge and to training those who may "carry on" in this sense.”

This grant will be used for the Research and Creative Collaborative, The Liberal Artisan. The Liberal Artisan reconnects labor and scholarship, the mind and the hand, and the material and the theoretical, in a program fostering a way of being and working grounded in embodied communities of knowledge and skill. It is a reminder of our interdependence and a warning for the fragility of expertise in the modern age. As we increasingly commit to cognitive skills and digital interfaces, we must also consider the roles of our bodies in learning, communication, and solidarity. As we prepare our students to be leaders, scholars, and entrepreneurs; we must also prepare them to be workers in a world where the dignity and value of their labor may not be recognized and must be advocated for. The Liberal Artisan resists forces of alienation, disembodiment, and social fragmentation by creating spaces to holistically and collaboratively address material, conceptual, and societal challenges.

This project extends the collaborative communities built through Dr. Twu'sBook of the Northproject and Dr. Tostevin's Anthropology Lab http://anthropologylabs.umn.edu/digital/library.html