The departments and programs of the Humanities Division are committed to the study of human meaning as it is expressed in diverse languages, explained in diverse literatures, and reflected upon from diverse philosophical and religious perspectives. Students seek to understand the values and purposes that make practices and systems worthwhile. In an increasingly interconnected world, the ability to critically consider how individuals and communities make sense of their world is an essential skill. Explore majors, minors, concentrations, and academic programs in the humanities.
American English Institute
Arabic Studies
Chinese
Chinese Flagship Program
Cinema Studies
Classical Civilization
Classics
Comparative Literature
Creative Writing
Comics and Cartoon Studies
Digital Humanities
Disability Studies
English
News from Humanities
All news »
We Love Our Supporters
Gifts to the College of Arts and Sciences can help our students make the most of their college careers. To do this, CAS needs your support. Your contributions help us ensure that teaching, research, advising, mentoring, and support services are fully available to every student. Thank you!
World-Class Faculty in the Humanities
Stephen Shoemaker
Professor of Religious Studies
Stephen Shoemaker teaches courses about Christian traditions and is a prolific contributor to research related to ancient and early medieval Christian traditions in early Byzantine and Near Eastern Christianity.
Shoemaker has received research fellowships over the years and received two in 2024 to complete the translation of the earliest surviving Christian hymnal from sixth-century Jerusalem, which is in Old Georgian. The fellowships include one from the National Endowment for the Humanities for 2024–2025 and a Senior Fellowship funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (German Research Foundation).
He recently published The Quest of the Historical Muhammad and Other Studies on Formative Islam (2024) and is the co-author of The Capture of Jerusalem by the Persians in 614 CE (2024).
Stacey Alaimo
Professor of English
Stacey Alaimo’s research explores the intersections between literary, artistic, political, and philosophical approaches to environmentalism. She has published three books and more than 60 scholarly articles, on such topics as toxins, gender and climate change, environmental justice, queer animals, Anthropocene feminisms, marine science studies, the blue humanities, and new materialist theory.
Her concept of trans-corporeality has been widely taken up in the arts, humanities and sciences. She has been interviewed many times in print and podcasts. Her work has been translated into at least 12 languages and has inspired several art exhibitions.
Her fourth book, The Abyss Stares Back: Encounters with Deep Sea Life (2025), explores the science and aesthetics of deep-sea creatures since the 1930s. Alaimo currently serves as the English department’s director of graduate studies and is a core faculty member in the Environmental Studies Program.
Lowell Bowditch
Professor of Classics
Lowell Bowditch is the head of the Department of Classics. Her research explores the interface between the literature and socio-political relations of Augustan Rome.
Her newest project addresses issues of free speech and censorship in the early imperial age. She explores this through the work of Ovid in the context of the growing authoritarianism of the Augustan regime, with the planned book to draw comparisons with the contemporary political landscape.
Her previous work focused on love elegy and Roman imperialism from postcolonial perspectives. Along with multiple articles and research papers, she is the author of two books and a commentary, including the most recent, Roman Love Elegy and the Eros of Empire (London and New York 2023).
Bowditch came to the UO in 1993 and particularly enjoys mentoring classics undergraduates and master’s students.
School of Global Studies and Languages
At the School of Global Studies and Languages (GSL), UO students engage with diverse cultures, languages, histories, and lifeways across the world. Students of the humanities, from Cinema Studies to Religious Studies, will broaden and deepen their education in their field by viewing it—and experiencing it—through a global lens. GSL prepares our graduates for life after college with an interdisciplinary curriculum, innovative language teaching, abundant learning opportunities outside the classroom, and paths of study that lead to many options for real-world careers.
Research in the Humanities
Inquiry in humanities fields centers around our collective human experience. Our stories are told in many forms, be it a script, a screenplay, a religious text, in literature or in folktales. Researchers in the humanities employ tools of analysis to explore the long history and rapidly changing landscape of ideas, values and beliefs that coalesce in a different sort of knowledge about reality and human life.
Explore Other Majors and Minors in the College of Arts and Sciences
Meet our Dean
The departments and programs of the Humanities Division share a commitment to the study of human experience as it is expressed in diverse languages and cultures throughout history and across the world. A Humanities education encourages students to think creatively, independently, and critically about the human past, present, and future. Whether they choose to focus on cinema, classical languages, or philosophical ideas, Humanities students learn to reason, to build arguments, to write and communicate with confidence and conviction, and to view the world and its challenges from multiple perspectives.
Our College of Arts and Sciences is committed to providing students with a genuine liberal arts education, which means that we strive to expose students to more than one way of knowing. We want our students to appreciate the profound differences—and the no-less profound similarities—in the way a philosopher, a biologist, and a political scientist approach the same questions about the human condition. The unique lens provided by the Humanities departments and programs at UO is an essential part of that liberal arts education, which we believe prepares students to live meaningful lives in the world.
Harry Wonham
Divisional Associate Dean, Humanities
Happening at CAS
Welcome back, Ducks! Cheers to a great summer term. 🎉#UOCAS pic.twitter.com/xmTL3jke4A
— UO College of Arts and Sciences (@uocas) June 24, 2024
11:00 a.m.–12:00 p.m.
Join NCFDD using your UO login credentials for this planning webinar meant to help you identify your personal and professional goals, create a strategic plan to accomplish them, and identify the types of community, support, and accountability you need to make this your most productive and balanced quarter ever. Register at https://www.ncfdd.org/webinars/semesterplan25.
Carlita Favero, PhD, is a Professor of Biology and Neuroscience at Ursinus College, an exclusively undergraduate liberal arts institution with about 1600 students. On her campus, she also serves as the Coordinator for the Neuroscience Program, and Co-Director for the Teaching and Learning Institute. She has developed courses on the FUNdamentals of Neuroscience, Developmental Neurobiology, and Glial Cell Biology. Her scholarly work investigates the consequences of alcohol exposure on brain wiring and behavior during embryonic brain development, a field she moved into during her first year on the tenure track. At NCFDD, she has served as a small group and one-on-one coach for the Faculty Success Program.
noon
Join our Exploring the Dolomites Info Session to explore an exciting study abroad opportunity for this summer! Learn more about this 14-day journey, where you can experience the best of the Dolomite Mountains of northeastern Italy, just south of the Alps.
4:00–6:30 p.m.
In a tour-de-force performance, writer-actor Aaron Davidman conjures a host of different characters while seeking answers to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in Wrestling Jerusalem. Creatively adapting his acclaimed one-man stage show using only simple props and backdrops, Davidman takes a multidimensional journey into the heart of the Middle East, and the intersection of politics, identity, and spiritual yearning. He embodies and gives voice to 17 different characters on all sides of the existential divide-deftly moving between male and female, Jewish and Muslim, Israeli, and Arab-modeling what it takes truly to bear witness through the eyes of the other. Challenging long-held beliefs with sharp and unblinking observation, Davidman finds both entrenched isolation and shared humanity in the shifting moral compasses and competing narratives of all his characters. The result is a unique hybrid of stage and cinema that reignites hope for the future of this troubled region.
Content warning: This work of art makes space for multiple perspectives and empathy for the “other”.
6:00–7:00 p.m.
Join the UO Women in Economics Club at our weekly meeting! We host faculty talks and guest lectures, provide career development opportunities, as well as peer support. All are welcome, regardless of major, minor, or gender identity!
The UO Women in Economics Club (WiE) was established in 2023 to support and meet the unique needs of women and gender-diverse individuals in the male-dominated economics field. WiE strives to build community, empower, and increase participation in economics through academic and social events. The club hosts guest speakers, roundtable discussions, professional development workshops, and more. Students undergraduate through PhD are welcome.
Meetings: Every odd week Thursday from 6-7pm in Allen 140. Hope to see you there!