Humanities on the Edge

Content

Humanities on the Edge is a speaker series co-founded by Dr. Marco Abel and Dr. Roland Végső. Founded in 2010, the series is now in its 16th year, and its mission remains the same: to promote cross-disciplinary conversation and theoretical research in the Humanities. 

Currently, the series is coordinated by Dr. Luis Othoniel Rosa (Modern Languages and Literatures and Institute for Ethnic Studies), Dr. Katie Anania (School of Art, Art History and Design), Erin Hanas (Curator of Academic Programs at the Sheldon Museum of Art), and Dr. Marco Abel (English).

2026-27: "On Fascism"

All events 5:30 - 7:00 p.m., Sheldon Museum of Art, Ethel S. Abbott Auditorium.
Free of charge and open to the public.

Oct 8“From Fascist Agitation to ‘Metapolitics’ : Genealogies of the New Right”
Johannes von Molke
Rudolf Arnheim Collegiate Professor, Department of Germanic Languages and Literatures and Department of Film, Television, and Media, University of Michigan
 
Nov 19“‘Concepts Completely Useless for the Purposes of Fascism’: Walter Benjamin and the Trolls"
Roland Végső
Professor of English, University of Georgia
 
Mar 4“The Fascism in Us All”
Tim Dean 
Frank Hodgins Chair in American Literature, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign 
 
Apr 22“Neurofascism: Digital Capitalism, the Fundamentalization of Identity, and the Obliteration of the Other”
Irmgard Emmelhainz 
Author of The Tyranny of Common Sense: Mexican Postneoliberal Conversion (SUNY, 2023) and Toxic Loves, Impossible Futures, Feminist Living as Resistance (Vanderbilt 2022) 
 

 

2025-26: "Trans* Ecologies"

All events 5:30 - 7:00 p.m., Sheldon Museum of Art, Ethel S. Abbott Auditorium.
Free of charge and open to the public.

Sept 18

“Sex, Science, and Forms of Defiance”
Dr. Jeanne Vaccaro

Assistant Professor of Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies
University of Kansas

Nov 13

“Whatever I Tell You I’m Going to Do Is Never Going to Happen – So Trans Out, Bro”
Allucquere Rosanne ‘Sandy’ Stone

Professor Emerita at the University of Texas at Austin and Founding Director of the Advanced Communication Technologies Laboratory (ACTLab) with Marjorie Vecchio, filmmaker; and Megan Malone, comedian

Feb 12

“The Task of the Trans Translator: Paradoxes of Visibility, Transcreations of Opacity”
Dr. Alex Brostoff

Assistant Professor of English and Women’s and Gender Studies
Georgetown University

Apr 2

“Anguila Translations and Slippery Gender Practices”
Dr. Roque Raquel Salas Rivera

Assistant Professor of Comparative Literature,
University of Puerto Rico–Mayagüez

HOTE 25-26

Co-founders: Dr. Marco Abel and Dr. Roland Végső

"We have reached a historical turning point, and [...] we must assume full responsibility for the direction of our futures."

Humanities on the Edge Manifesto