Building a scholarly community
On a Wednesday afternoon in April, a cohort of scholars from the School of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences (SHASS) gathered in MIT’s Lewis Music Library.
This group of seven professors are the inaugural SHASS Faculty Fellows , a semester-long program launched this past spring. The faculty represent a variety of disciplines across the school. They met biweekly through the spring to connect over lunch and present updates on their respective research projects.
At this particular meeting, associate professor of music Emily Richmond Pollock presented some of her work — a chapter about an opera festival in Sarasota, Florida — which, she says, started from “my own curiosity about how American institutions relate to opera’s traditions and practices.”
After Pollock’s presentation, the group discussed and provided a sounding board for her work. It’s precisely the type of scholarly environment the SHASS Faculty Fellows program was designed to foster.
“The fellows program is a recognition of the fact that not only do we benefit from being in conversation with other scholars, but even more so when in conversation with scholars who do things differently than we do, who approach problems with different opening questions and methodologies,” says Anne McCants, the Ann F. Friedlaender Professor of History and Faculty Fellows Program Committee chair.
Along with committee member and literature professor Arthur Bahr, McCants serves as a kind of moderator during the discussions, asking pointed questions and interrogating participants’ assumptions.