MISSOURI PASSAGES Volume 11, Number 3. May, 2013

In ThIs Issue

Gerald Early Delivers Humanities Awards KeynotePage 1

St. Louis Festival Makes Us Greedy for More HumanitiesKaren LucasPage 2

Not Just a Luxury:A Letter from the Executive DirectorGeoff GiglieranoPage 3

Missouri Humanities Awards Celebrate Humanities LeadersPage 4

“Proud to Be” Volume Two Submissions Pouring In; Deadline July 1Deborah MarshallPage 4

MHC Joins 15 Minute Reading PledgeJulie DouglasPage 5

READ from the START Garners Support from all Corners of StateJim WeidmanPage 6

Once Upon a Time: Tales Shared during St. Louis Storytelling FestivalPage 6

Gerald Early Delivers Humanities Awards Keynote

For a long time, the humanities have

been the sick person of the American university, frequently marginalized and misunderstood by the public, often mismanaged and misrepresented by their own scholars and adherents. . . . According to the common belief, studying the humanities cannot get you a job, cannot cure cancer or aid the public in any way, and cannot help the economy. The humanities are useless.

. . . .

He [Florida governor Rick Scott] wants his people to go into STEM [science, technology, engineering and math] fields because that is where the jobs are, but doesn’t the internet and our other technological toys need graphic designers, writers, filmmakers, linguists, photographers and musicians in order to have content? If these people did not exist, what exactly would be on the internet?

. . . .

You could not understand nor have any way of understanding the world you live in without the humanities. . . . And it is our ideas, our arguments, our sense of story and myth which constitute the stuff of life and dreams for human beings. Those are things that give us meaning. When we declared our independence from Great Britain, it was not done through mathematical equations or scientific formulas. It was done with a declaration. It was done with words, ideas and argument.

. . . .

Human beings can live productively without

antibiotics and they can live productively without cell phones and computers, they can live productively without electricity or cars; we know this because human beings have done this in the past; but they cannot live without making the objects around them and making themselves and their activities mean something. . . . We are the only animals that can,

through our meanings, delude ourselves so convincingly that we will believe what we think we see rather than what is really there. And the disciplines with the longest and most profound histories of showing us how we make meaning and why are the humanities.

. . . .

The humanities are about how we construct a criticism of life itself, how we try to understand life and how we try to change it. Without the humanities, STEM education would be meaningless because STEM would be operating in a void without values, without ideals, without interpretation and without moral argument.

. . . .

My remarks today were not meant to be a defense for the humanities. After all, the humanities really need no defense ... They [the humanities] are part of the living, breathing, changing culture that makes us what we are. Despite all our glorious machines and majestic technology, we know from human history and our collective religious and spiritual vision that it is love and only love that has been always trying to save us in spite of ourselves. And where can one learn about love and our troubled yet enduring journey towards it except through the humanities?

Dr. Gerald Early, Merle Kling Professor of Modern Letters at Washington University in St. Louis, delivered the keynote speech at the 2013 Missouri Humanities Awards. The following is an excerpt of his address. His complete speech can be accessed at mohumanities.org.

Dr. Gerald Early delivering the keynote speech at the 2013 Missouri Humanities Awards ceremony.

PAGE 2 MISSOURI PASSAGES

St. Louis Festival Makes Us Greedy for More HumanitiesContributed by Karen Lucas, University of Missouri—St. Louis Center for the Humanities associate director

The second annual Greater St. Louis Humanities Festival was a smashing

success. Participating organizations brought the theme “Money, Money: Need, Greed and Generosity” to life with classic films, dramatic productions, readings, lectures and panel discussions. There was something for everyone with topics ranging over a myriad of cultural and intellectual activities, including philosophy, fiction, economic history and geography, theater, music and cinema.

The Festival grew in just one year from five institutions with three events over two days to eleven institutions with eight events over three days. Intense planning and funding from the Regional Arts Commission and the Whitaker Foundation enabled the Festival to expand and continue offering free admission.

The University of Missouri—St. Louis Center for the Humanities director and I served on the Festival planning committee. Our Center presented a reading and discussion about money in literature by novelist Martha McPhee and NPR.org book reviewer Heller McAlpin, both New York based.

Festival organizers recognized the Festival’s potential to involve more local residents in the humanities and, over time, provide St. Louis a cultural tourism opportunity. Reactions of our out-of-town presenters confirm that tourism potential: McPhee and McAlpin, along with McAlpin’s husband, not only offered their own literary event, but also attended five other Festival events. They were effusive in their compliments and enthusiasm for the liveliness of the arts and humanities here.

Martha McPhee wrote, “Thank you for including me in your wonderful festival. I came home thoroughly exhilarated. I adored meeting you and seeing St. Louis through your eyes and art.”

McPhee said she had no idea how much was going on culturally here until she experienced the Festival. Now she

intends to bring her family to visit St. Louis so she can share our region with them.

McAlpin emailed on departure, “Can’t thank you enough for a wonderful, stimulating weekend. . . . I have to repeat how amazed I am at all the Festival planners did to organize the many talks and events.”

She added later, “Martha, David and I want you to know how well we all thought it went: fun, stimulating, superbly well-organized. The whole weekend was an ‘up.’ I still have strong after-images of shadowy venetian blinds and Zasu Pitts’s weird gaze in my mind’s eye.”

The after-images of shadowy venetian blinds and Zasu Pitts’s weird gaze are in the mind’s eye of many Missourians, too. The blinds were in the “Double Indemnity” film Webster University showed and discussed with a 90-person audience on the Festival’s opening night. Zasu Pitts starred in the closing night’s silent film, “Greed,” that Cinema St. Louis (partnering with Webster University Film Series) screened to a packed house of 275. The room wasn’t silent for this silent film because of the fantastic original score prepared and

performed by the Rats and People Motion Picture Orchestra.

I particularly enjoyed being able to contrast the “Double Indemnity” film with the “Double Indemnity” production by the St. Louis Repertory Theatre Company on Friday night. The discussions Webster University arranged about the film and play and the book they were based on, Frank Norris’s “McTeague,” completed the experience. Those who attended several Festival events found many unanticipated connections among them.

To mention one line of connections: Washington University Center for the Humanities presented economic historian Louis Hyman on the U.S. transition from a cash-based consumer economy to one of credit. That Friday afternoon Hyman’s slides included a photo of a small shop in the early 20th century with a sign extolling the virtues of cash and evil of buying “on the tab.” Saturday afternoon, the Missouri Humanities Council’s presentation at the Missouri History Museum took the discussion of economic history local, focusing on decisions about what money would flow where, shaping our region and community relations. And to complete the circle, in Saturday night’s “Greed” showing, we saw the penniless lead character looking in dismay at a sign behind the bar where he wants to buy a drink. As in Hyman’s slide, the sign warns “Cash is heavenly. Credit is hell.” It provided one of those “aha” moments that many people surely had at their Festival outings.

The other fabulous events included a performance by Prison Performing Arts alumni actors; an interdisciplinary panel,“The Logic of the Gift,” by St. Louis University faculty; and an examination of arts funding organized by Laumeier Sculpture Park at the Contemporary Art Museum.

We look forward to the April 2014 Greater St. Louis Humanities Festival — “Immigration and Migration.”

The logo (above) of the Humanities Festival at which Dr. Colin Gordon (below) presented “The Geography of Money” at MHC’s event.

PAGE 3 MISSOURI PASSAGES

Not Just a Luxury: A Letter from the Executive Director

On April 17, the Missouri Humanities Council presented

the 2013 Missouri Humanities Awards in a ceremony that featured a keynote speech by Dr. Gerald Early, a board member of MHC, professor of English at Washington University in St. Louis and a founder of the Greater St. Louis Humanities Festival. In his comments, he addressed the importance of the humanities for us as individuals and as a society, directly and forcefully challenging the notion that the humanities are irrelevant or a luxury.

I still find it curious when people argue that the humanities are not terribly useful in contemporary society and the current economy. The things that we learn through the study of history, literature, languages, religion, philosophy, etc. provide us with the means to think critically and creatively. They enable us to solve problems both collectively and as individuals. The humanities, as Cornell University economist Louis Hyman said to me in a conversation during our recent St. Louis Humanities Festival, are about “learning how to learn.”

Let’s put that into practical terms. The humanities make us better competitors in a dynamic and rapidly evolving global economy.

Did I just say that the humanities can make us more competitive?

Yes. That’s exactly what I said.

Economic success requires skills in critical and creative thinking, the ability to make associations between disparate elements and data, the capability to assess complex information and ideas and to draw useful conclusions from those processes.

In a 2010 speech before the Royal Irish Academy at Trinity College in Dublin, Harvard University President Drew Faust observed that, “at the heart of the liberal arts and fundamental to the humanities — and indeed central to much of scientific thought — is the capacity for interpretation, for making meaning and making sense out of the world around us. We are all bombarded with information. That is a defining aspect of the new global knowledge economy and the digital

platforms on which it rests.”

In short, communities, states and nations which lack a population with these kinds of skills will be less prepared to compete. And there is evidence that suggests that other people in other places are certainly looking at education in this way. In that same speech, President Faust stated:

The ideal and breadth of liberal education that embraces the humanities and arts as well as the social and natural sciences . . . confronts challenges in the United States as it does elsewhere in a world so intent on bottom lines and measures of utility.

Ironically, matters seem to be moving in a rather different direction in China. As we risk eroding our support for the humanities, prominent institutions in China are turning to embrace them. At lunch with a dozen or so Chinese university leaders in Shanghai last March, I was surprised to find that what was foremost in their minds, what they most wanted to discuss, was the humanities — the need to expand and strengthen them, the need to address questions of meaning and value even within those institutions primarily focused on science. Curricular reform under way at a number of Chinese universities is requiring a broad range of course offerings, and university leaders are committed to enhancing the teaching of philosophy, history and literature. . . . Two-thirds of Chinese undergraduate students pursue degrees in the sciences; fewer than one-third of American students do. Perhaps we are each worried about what our students might be neglecting. But as we marvel at the growth of higher education and the emerging strength of science in China, we should note as well the increasing interest and attention of the Chinese to the humanities.

I also would like to point out that it is not just about “learning how to learn,” as Hyman suggested to me, in the context of formal education. The humanities have their greatest impact when we are learning from early childhood and throughout our lives. These processes do not cease when someone hands you a degree. That is why it is so vital that MHC be able to keep doing programs like READ from the START, as well as our exhibits, online immersive learning, veterans creative writing, the St. Louis Humanities Festival our Speakers Bureau and so on which serve adult audiences.

We have to read, listen and share or we are going to be left behind in more ways than one.

Contributed by Geoff Giglierano, MHC executive director

Geoff GiglieranoMHC executive director

Upcoming “The Civil War in Missouri” Exhibit LocationsNevada

ColumbiaMay 25-July 21Aug. 10-Oct. 6

Bushwhacker MuseumDaniel Boone Public Library

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“Proud to Be” Volume Two Submissions Pouring In; Deadline July 1

Submissions for the second volume of “Proud to Be:

Writing by American Warriors” are already pouring in, according to Dr. Susan Swartwout, editor of the series.

“The response has been stellar,” reported Dr. Swartwout, “with 58 submissions already in for the contest and the anthology. We generally receive the most submissions during the week before the deadline, so to have so many this early is remarkable!”

Although submissions have come from veterans and family members from across the country, Missouri writers have submitted the most up to this point. Several submissions have also been received from North Carolina, Nebraska and California. All branches of the military, veterans and active military and family members are eligible to participate.

The call for submission and contest feature five categories

for the 2013 anthology with a $250 prize for the winner in each contest category, sponsored by the Missouri Humanities Council. Categories include essays, interviews with veterans, short fiction, poetry and photography. Winners and two finalists will be named in each category, along with special recognition for one Missouri contributor by MHC. These 16 submissions will appear in a special section in the front of the 2013 anthology.

This year’s panel of judges again boasts a wealth of literary and artistic expertise. The panel is comprised of Missouri poet laureate William Trowbridge, judging poetry; author Thomas Cushman, interviews; author and editor Mary Troy, short fiction; Destinee Oitzinger, assistant curator at the National Veterans Art Museum, photography; and military historian John McManus, essays.

The anthology is published through the collaborative efforts of the Missouri Humanities Council, Warriors Arts Alliance and Southeast Missouri University Press.

Complete submission guidelines are available at warriorsartsalliance.com.

Contributed by Deborah Marshall, MHC veterans programming coordinator

The Missouri Humanities Council honored the

2013 Missouri Humanities Awards recipients for their achievements in the humanities April 17 in Jefferson City. Each year, MHC celebrates the accomplishments of individuals and organizations that have made exceptional contributions to the understanding of Missouri, its people and its stories.

“The Humanities Awards are a wonderful celebration for all the awardees and their communities. It was nice to see not only the honorees honored but then they in turn honor the folks that partnered with them in support, too,” said Michele Newton Hansford, Missouri Humanities Council board chair.

The 2013 awardees include: Johnson County Historical

Society; “The Kingdom at Work,” The Way We Worked Project; Jean Cantwell; Chief Glenna Wallace; and Dr. Dennis K. Boman.

Special guest Secretary of State Jason Kander honored each awardee with a personal gift, while Dr. Gerald Early, the Merle Kling Professor of Modern Letters, professor of English at Washington University in St. Louis presented the keynote address.

Resolutions were presented by Rep. Bill Lant, Sen. Ron Richard, Sen. Joseph Keaveny, Rep. Mike Colona, Rep. Jeffery Justus, Sen. David Sater, Sen. David Pearce, Rep. Denny Hoskins and Sen. Jolie Justus.

The awards were sculpted by Missouri ceramist Dawson Morgan.

Photos from the event are available at facebook.com/mohumanities.

Missouri Humanities Awards Celebrate Humanities Leaders

Secretary of State Jason Kander (top) presented each 2013 Missouri Humanities Award recipient with a personal gift, nine legislators awarded resolutions, including Rep. Lant (second from top) while MHC bestowed recipients hand-crafted vases from a Missouri artist (third from top). All the awardees (bottom) posed with their award certificates. Pictured (left to right): Chief Glenna Wallace, Dr. Dennis K. Boman, Johnson County Historical Society, Jean Cantwell and “The Kingdom at Work.”

May 23Springfield

Great Circle-Boys & Girls Town (Session 2)

May 23Montgomery CityYouth In Need

Montgomery Head Start (Session 2)

May 28Kansas City

Love-A-TOT Child Care (Session 1)

June 11Kansas City

Love-A-TOT Child Care (Session 2)

RecenT GRanTs awaRded

Best Practice in History Education ConferenceMissouri Council for History Education

$7,350

The African–American Experience in Arrow RockFriends of Arrow Rock

$5,000

McDonald County MuseumMcDonald County Historical Society

$4,500

150th Anniversary of the Battle of HartvilleHartville R-II School District

$2,500

Classic French Film FestivalCinema St. Louis

$2,500

From Slave to Citizen SoldierYouth and Family Center

$2,500

The 2013 Blind Boone Ragtime andEarly Jazz Festival

John William Boone Heritage Foundation$2,500

Huck Finn Freedom Center: Jim’s JourneyHannibal African American Life & History Project

$2,500

Recollections of the Civil WarMark Twain Home Foundation

$2,400

PAGE 5 MISSOURI PASSAGES

MHC Joins 15 Minute Reading PledgeContributed by Julie Douglas, MHC family programs director

“I didn’t know I could be reading to my 2-year-old all of this time!”

“At READ from the START, I learned all of the things that happen in my baby’s brain when I read to him. I never knew reading was so good for my baby!”

“I thought I couldn’t read to my child until she was older.”

We hear these types of comments from our READ from the START participants all of the time. Fortunately, we are in good company

when it comes to spreading the word about family reading! While READ from the START is a unique program that teaches parents how to make books come alive for their kids, many organizations share our mission of getting parents to read to their children in those precious first five years.

MHC has recently joined in an effort to increase awareness about reading to babies and preschoolers. As a Read Aloud 15 MINUTES national campaign partner, we will raise our voice (through social media and our website) and spread the word that reading aloud 15 minutes daily to a child from birth is the single most effective thing a parent can do to stimulate a child’s brain and promote early language acquisition and literacy skills. By participating in “campaign pulses,” we will share statistics and encouraging messages about reading to children.

Read Aloud 15 MINUTES is a non-profit organization founded in 2008, focused on the power of reading aloud. In 2012, Read Aloud began a decade-long national campaign, the 15 MINUTES movement. By partnering with other organizations and businesses that are invested in child development and education, the 15 MINUTES movement aims to make reading aloud every day for 15 minutes the new parenting standard.

Why such a push to encourage family reading? Check out Read Alound’s infographic:

READ from the START Schedule

PAGE 6 MISSOURI PASSAGES

READ from the START Garners Support from all Corners of StateContributed by Jim Weidman, MHC development director

READ from the Start

(RFTS), the flagship program of the Missouri Humanities Council, continues to attract support from foundations and corporations around the state. This program educates parents,

guardians and caretakers of young children, ages birth through age five on methods of reading to and engaging with their children through books and storytelling.

Typical feedback for this program regularly echoes one parent who said, “This is the best program I have ever attended. You better believe I’m going to keep reading to my kids on a regular basis!”

Support in St. Louis for this program

comes from The Saigh Foundation, which funds St. Louis-area organizations benefiting children and youth in the areas of education and health care. The Foundation continues the important work begun by Fred Saigh, who was dedicated especially to aiding those who might not otherwise receive assistance.

Additional support in St. Louis comes from the credit department of Commerce Bank who donated the proceeds from an employee fundraiser and from Thrivent Financial for Lutherans.

The Riedel Foundation supports RFTS specifically for programs in the city of Hannibal. The Foundation supports programs that promote Hannibal’s economic well-being and overall quality of life with a focus on unique programs that other organizations are not providing and are directed toward Hannibal’s youth.

In Kansas City, support for RFTS comes from The Woman’s City Club

Charitable Foundation. The Foundation supports the cultural arts and education in the Kansas City area with special consideration given to programs for women and/or children.

Many Target stores throughout the state of Missouri support RFTS through its early childhood reading grants that support programs fostering a love of reading and encouraging young children preschool through third grade to read together with their families. Last year, several Walmart stores around the state supported RFTS as well.

If you are interested in bringing a READ from the START program to your area, please contact Julie Douglas, family programs director at julie@mohumanities.org. If you would like to support this program and guarantee its future, please contact Jim Weidman, development director at jim@mohumanities.org. Both can be reached at 314.781.9660.

Jim Weidman, development director

The Missouri Humanities Council proudly took part in

the St. Louis Storytelling Festival for a second continuous year by hosting “Storytelling for Preschool Teachers” on May 4. Led by gifted storyteller and READ from the START discussion leader Annette Harrison, participants learned techniques to make stories come alive.

“Storytelling for Preschool Teachers” was a big draw, with a packed house the day of the event. Attendees included more than preschool teachers, but aspiring storytellers, preschool reading volunteers, parents and grandparents.

Harrison encouraged the audience to immerse themselves in the stories and to engage all of the listeners’ senses when telling a story. She showed the group how

to use open-ended questions and visual thinking strategies to draw a child into a book.

The participants not only got to hear about how to tell stories, they role-played and dabbled in storytelling during the workshop as well. Harrison’s enthusiasm and imagination were contagious! It wasn’t long before the room was filled with laughter and very animated voices.

Participants received several children’s books, including two of Harrison’s current favorites: “Goodnight Moon,” by Margaret Wise Brown, and “The Hello, Goodbye Window,” by Norton Juster. Equipped with lots of great ideas and books that have high kid-appeal, the participants left the workshop ready to create some story time magic with the children in their lives.

Once Upon a Time: Tales Shared during St. Louis Storytelling Festival

A group of all ages and professions learned from storyteller Annette Harrison at MHC’s St. Louis Storytelling Festival event May 4.

SpeakerS’ Bureau Schedule

June 12The Day the Mississippi Ran Backwards

6 p.m.Joplin Public Library

In 2013, public libraries can host a Speakers’ Bureau presentation for only $25, a $50 saving on

the program fee.