The Wolfsonian Public Humanities Lab (WPHL) serves as FIU’s hub for public-facing humanities research, teaching and engagement. Our lab uses FIU’s status as an urban research institution and its strategic location in Miami to capture and magnify the creative, scholarly and pedagogical expertise of faculty, staff and students who are committed to doing public-facing work.
On Thursdays at 10:00 a.m., WPHL faculty host a remote, informal chat with directors and leaders of museums and other cultural institutions to discuss how they and their institutions are addressing the challenges of working against institutional powers that have historically erased, marginalized, or whitewashed Black histories.. These conversations are free and open to the public over Zoom.
This platform aims to hear - and record – the stories from the members of our FIU community and South Florida at large in this very difficult and unsettling moment. By hearing from you, the WPHL can learn from you, and create a community of knowledge and empathy as we struggle to understand how the ground is shifting beneath us. We will emerge stronger and with an archive of stories in a multitude of formats (textual, sound/visual, digital) able to remind us and teach us as we move forward together. We will encourage expression of all kinds, from photography to words in the form of free thought and poetry and art.
The WPHL cements FIU’s position on the vanguard of academia by creating an integrative research center, teaching lab, and degree program dedicated to a pioneering field now emerging at top universities across the country: public humanities.
