The Committee for the Provostial Fund awards seven new proposals

The Office of the Dean for the Arts and Humanities has announced that the Committee for the Provostial Fund in the Arts and Humanities has recently awarded funds to the following seven proposals (in alphabetical order by title).

BYO (Bring Your Own) — Voices of the Contemporary at the Carpenter Center: BYO provides a public forum for debate about pressing issues in contemporary culture by bringing emerging and cutting-edge figures in contemporary art for open conversations with members of the Harvard and Boston-area arts communities (April 2007).

Cultural Creativity in the Ethiopian American Diaspora: A conference which will include a keynote address, a full day of presentations and discussions, and a concert of Ethiopian composer Mulatu Astatke’s recent works (April 13-14, 2008).

Innovative Computing in the Humanities: A program of research presentations and hands-on demonstrations highlighting innovative computing for the humanities (Oct. 17, 2007).

“The Legacies of Francis James Child: The Ballad and American Education”: A conference and resulting volume will bring the voices of Harvard students of narrative folk song together with major national and international scholars in a dialogue on Child’s biography, ballad scholarship, and education. Additionally, the conference and volume will explore the music and history of specific folk songs and the nexus between ballad and epic (December 2008).

“Narrating the World: Current Debates in Science and Literary Studies Revised”: An interdisciplinary conference organized by historians of science and literary scholars to discuss the role of narratives in the sciences as well as the ways literary texts function as forms of epistemic writing (April 4-5, 2008).

Pushkin Symposium: In a multidisciplinary collaboration of Harvard departments in the humanities and music, this symposium will reappraise seminal areas in the life and work of Aleksandr Sergeyevich Pushkin (1799-1837), Russia’s national poet, in order to consider his African heritage, his impact on the other areas of cultural and aesthetic life, and the innovative and universal significance of his oeuvre (April 4-5, 2008).

“From Rhubarb to Rubies: Travels to Safavid Iran, 1550-1700”: The Center for Middle Eastern Studies will host a one-day symposium on May 9, 2008, on European travels to Safavid (held in conjunction with the exhibitions of the same name at the Houghton Library and the Harvard Map Collection [May 8-Aug. 20, 2008]).