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
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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
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The Limits and Possibilities of Cross-border Latinidades & Indigeneities April 24 / 12pm-5pm / Ford Lecture Hall, JSMA
The Limits and Possibilities of Cross-border Latinidades & Indigeneities symposium will bring together interdisciplinary Latinx and Indigenous scholars and researchers studying settler colonialism, transnational Indigeneities, and race through archival and ethnographic approaches. The conference will explore the boundaries between Indigeneity and Latinidad, both historically and in the present. It examines shifting borders and interactions of Indigenous and Latine people and diasporas, focusing on regions that are now California, Texas, Oregon, Mexico, and Central America.
12pm-1pm: Conference Opening and Keynote Presenters: María Josefina Saldaña-Portillo (New York University); Moderated by Chris Chavez (SOJC, University of Oregon); Special remarks by Jason Younker, Assistant Vice President, Advisor to the President on Sovereignty and Government-to-Government Relations, Chief, Coquille Tribe
1pm-2pm: Pre-1848 Mexican Borderlands: Californio Ranchero Culture and Indigenous California Presenters: Yvette Saavedra (Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, University of Oregon) and Naomi Sussman (History, University of Oregon); Moderated by Laura Pulido (Indigenous, Race, and Ethnic Studies, University of Oregon)
2pm-3pm: Media, History and Citizenship of Indigenous and Latinx Peoples: Contested Lands and Identities across the Borderlands Presenters: Ramón Resendiz (Indiana University, UO Anthropology) and Rachel Nez (Navajo Diné Nation, Fort Lewis College); Moderated by Gabe Sanchez (Anthropology, University of Oregon)
3pm-4pm: Building Comunidad and Transborder Territories in Indigenous Diasporas From Mexico and Guatemala Presenters: Daina Sanchez (UC Santa Barbara) and Lynn Stephen (Anthropology, University of Oregon); Moderated by Jason Younker (University of Oregon)
4pm-5pm: Closing Remarks and Conversation Closing remarks from Miguel Gualdrón Ramírez (Philosophy, University of Oregon) and María Josefina Saldaña-Portillo (New York University)
5pm-6pm: Post-conference Reception Mingle with presenters and enjoy complimentary food and refreshments. All are welcome!
Questions? Email cllas@uoregon.edu
3:30–5:30 p.m.
The 2025 China Town Hall program will discuss President Trump’s China policy 100 days in, with featured speakers Ryan Hass, Director of John L. Thorton China Center at the Brookings Institution; Matthew Turpin, Visiting Fellow at the Hoover Institution; and Lingling Wei, Chief China Correspondent at The Wall Street Journal.
The University of Oregon's local discussion will be led by Daniel Buck, Associate Professor of Geography at the University of Oregon, who is currently teaching ASIA 480: Chinese Economy in spring, 2025.
The event is hosted by the Center for Asian and Pacific Studies at the University of Oregon.
6:00–7:30 p.m.
Will Jones, professor of history at the University of Minnesota, will deliver the Bob Bussel Labor History Lecture on April 24, 2025.
The UO Labor Education and Research Center (LERC) created the lecture in recognition of Bob Bussel’s years of service as LERC’s director and an affiliated member of the UO history department. The lecture features historians with a distinguished record of scholarship, a commitment to public history, and an interest in labor and working-class issues. Will Jones is a professor of history at the University of Minnesota with a particular interest in issues of race and class. Professor Jones is the author of two books and numerous articles on labor and working-class history. He is also a past president of the Labor and Working-Class History Association.
6:00–10:00 p.m.
The Women’s Center is beyond excited to invite you to our annual Take Back the Night Rally, March and Speak-Out Against Sexual and Domestic Violence.
Take Back the Night is on Thursday, April 24, starting with the rally at 6:00pm followed by the march at 7:00pm and student-led speak-out at 8pm.
The rally begins in the EMU Amphitheater at 13th Ave. and University St. followed by an approximately 1.6 mile march from the UO campus through the streets of Eugene and back to UO campus in the EMU Cedar and Spruce Rooms where the student-led speak out (by and for students) is held.
The UO Women’s Center holds this event in collaboration with the UO Campus Community (UO Muxeres, UOIWMGW, Prevention SVPE,UO Green and Yellow Garter Band and more).
Community collaborators will be on hand from 5:00 pm to 6:00 pm at tables surrounding the rally area.
Take Back the Night Rally, March and Speak-Out Against Sexual and Domestic Violence is an event for the entire University of Oregon campus community. Take Back the Night is a yearly international protest founded in 1976 which seeks to raise awareness about the realities of sexual and domestic violence on campus and in the community, both for survivors of sexual and domestic violence and those who want to support and bear witness in solidarity. Take Back the Night is a survivor-centered event that begins with a rally in the EMU Amphitheater, continues as a march through the streets of Eugene to symbolize reclaiming people’s safety on public streets at night, and ends with a student-led speak-out on campus during which survivors and allies can share personal stories of how sexual and domestic violence has impacted their lives.
The rally will feature UO student speakers from diverse intersecting identities and lived experiences, including the Native American community, Latine community, LGBTQIA2S+ community, a child abuse prevention advocacy organization and more.
Our theme for this year’s event is REST IS RESISTANCE, inspired by the work of Black activist Tricia Hersey. As well, we will continue to center marginalized communities too often left out of essential dialogue about sexual and domestic violence - despite being disproportionately impacted by these systems of oppression. As always, the Women’s Center is committed to providing this essential event to support survivors, educate the community and prevent future harm.
ASL interpretation will be provided at the rally. This event is wheelchair accessible and will have transportation available during the march and back to student-led speak-out. We ask that no UO professional staff or media be present during the student-led speak-out portion of the event to provide a sacred space for students to have dialogue circles of peer-to-peer support.
Event will take place **rain or shine** and is free and open to the public. We support and believe survivors in ALL WEATHER! Masks are not required but highly encouraged. Questions regarding Take Back the Night should be directed to:
UO Women’s Center Program Assistant, Karyn Schultz (karyns@uoregon.edu) UO Women's Center Leadership Fellow, alejandra pedraza (apedraza@uoregon.edu) UO Women’s Center Sexual Violence Prevention & Education Student Coordinator, Lola Sponaas (svpewc@uoregon.edu)