The national donation for the subsidies of the Humanities has a wide range: NPR

In essence, the humanities are all about what makes us human – such as language, religion, philosophy, history, art, community and identity.

In practice, subsidies from the National Donation for the Humanities (NEH) funded Historical preservation, museums, literary festivals, media projects and community -based research. Examples are the film of Ken Burns The Civil War and the Lower East Side Tenement MuseumAs well as efforts to to rescue the Tlingit language and to marking The Mississippi Blues Trail.

Financing the future, from AI to community lectures

“The humanities help us the human experience in the past and today to understand to frame and shape the future,” said Lauren Tiltton, a professor of digital humanities at the University of Richmond.

Last year a project received a subsidy of $ 491,863 for the Center for Liberal Arts and AI (Claai) at the University of Richmond, as part of the NEHs Humanities Perspectives on artificial intelligence initiative.

The center would be the Nexus for 15 colleges in the southeast who want to study “how we understand and develop AI because AI influences all parts of our lives. How do we want to design AI? What do we want it to do? What do we not want to do and how does this influence people and communities?” Said Tiltton.

After working on the project for two years, her group expected to launch the Center for Liberal Arts and AI this fall. Then, last week, she got one letter It states that NEH funds were immediately in force for its project. More than a thousand subsidies are the same fate in national and urban areas in all 50 states.

“It was incredibly painful to read,” Tiltton said.

The letter partially stated that the agency “reused its financing allocations in a new direction to promote President Trump’s agenda.”

Tiltton said she believes that the AI ​​center would promote President Trump’s agenda, which indicates his executive orders related To Ai. “So now we discourage the area and research and education that must be central in the future of our nation,” she said.

As for now, Tiltton said that the schools involved are looking for private philanthropy for financing. “We are getting ahead. But the shifts in financing really delays us,” she said.

Make subsidies more accessible

Neither the White House nor the NEH responded to the requests of NPR for comment.

Critics of federal financing for art and culture have argued that taxpayers should not pay for Highbrow museums, theaters and other institutions that do not serve everyday Americans.

“Since art museums, Symphony Orchesten, Humanities Scholarship and Public Television and Radio are enjoyed by people with a larger than average income and education” Handbook for policy makers“The federal cultural agencies supervise a fundamentally unfair transfer of wealth of the lower classes.”

Nevertheless, both art and the humanities have awarded millions of dollars to subsidies that give priority to disadvantaged communities in the US. They include the NEHs Cultural and Community Waterage Grants ProgramThese efforts supported cultural resources against the effects of climate change and the NEAs Challenge Americawho mainly supported small art organizations. The future of both initiatives is unclear. Challenge America is “canceled for FY 2026” and cultural and community administration is “not being repaired”, according to the websites of the agencies.

Make subsidies more accessible

R. Chris Davis is a history professor at Lone Star College with campuses in the Houston area. He was very happy to learn about the Humanities -Initiatives to Community CollegesA subsidy program that De NEH launched in 2015.

“It is an opportunity for Faculty to explore ideas, initiatives, professional development and to create course content for students at these often disadvantaged institutions,” he said.

Last spring, Lone Star College-Online received A NEH subsidy of $ 150,000 for Davis to develop adapted courses that would teach history through the lens of various “thematic tracks” such as technology, culture, sports or medicine. Davis said the idea came after investigating students about what would make them more involved in history.

Davis said that students could supplement their regular course content with topics “more focused on their interests.”

Now, with the subsidy, the project is ‘in the dark’. Davis said he is especially disappointed for his students.

“Many of our students work full -time. They are carers of parents or their own children,” he said. “So everything we can do to help them be more successful, to make their university career more interesting, not only to improve the success rates, but also to retain it.

Getting a NEH subsidy is like scoring a home run

It is not a small achievement to receive a trade fair for Humanities. The competition is stiff. In most cases, applicants must have a proven track record, describe their proposals and budgets in detail, engage academic consultants and show how they will measure the impact.

“It was a huge honor to get a National Endowment for Humanities Grant last year,” said filmmaker Yuriko Romer. “And now this is just heartbreaking.”

Last August, Romer received a subsidy for Diamond diplomacyA documentary that follows the history of relationships between the US-Japan through the lens of baseball. “I originally received $ 600,000 for my documentary and the remaining balance is $ 342,598,” she said.

Romer started working on Diamond diplomacy About 10 years ago “Because it took me so long to raise the money to make this film.”

She said she employs around 14 people to help with production, research, access to archive material and more. There are plans to screen the documentary in the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York at the end of May.

Romer said that she is at home to finish the film, but to pay for costs and compensate for her crew, she will “have to merge some more financing at the moment.”

Romer said that losing the rest of her NEH subsidy is discouraging – that making documentaries is a difficult matter. “None of us does this to make money,” she said. “We are all passionate about the stories we want to tell.”

Meghan Sullivan This story edited for radio and internet. Chloee Weiner produced the radio tuk.