Public Humanities: Engaging Community, Empowering Civic Discourse, and Reshaping Academia Edited by Molly Todd and Jason E. Cohen

Engaged public scholarship is transforming the humanities. Divided into four parts, Public Humanities (Michigan State University Press, 2025) examines historical and contemporary sites of education and pedagogy, challenges dominant narratives about certain symbolic sites in the United States and across the Americas, highlights the struggle of marginalized communities as they wrestle to rewrite individual and collective memories of violence and trauma, and features public humanities projects that address themes relating to place and environment. Each chapter is concerned with the importance of personal relationships in educational settings, power relations in public humanities projects, and the nurturing of “new” civic spaces and places. This provocative volume contributes to timely debates about public-facing and publicly engaged scholarship, especially in the humanities.

Molly Todd is an independent scholar whose historical and public humanities work with refugees, human rights, and solidarity has been supported by the Whiting Foundation, the National Humanities Center, and other entities. Jason E. Cohen is an independent scholar who works and lives in the White Mountains of New Hampshire.