National Humanities Center Announces Lineup for 2026 Being Human Festival (US)
April 17–May 3, 2026
What do an interactive theater performance and craft workshop in Kansas, a public art and activism party in Washington D.C., a hands-on exploration of New Orleans’ funeral traditions, and a literary canoe trip down the Mississippi River all have in common? They are just a few of the events in the exciting lineup for the National Humanities Center’s third annual Being Human Festival (US).
Building on the successes of the previous two years, this year’s festival will include twenty-three events staged in locations across the country. These community-focused events, organized and presented by local artists, scholars, and educators, highlight the incredible breadth of the humanities and demonstrate the innumerable ways they add depth and meaning to our daily lives, help us understand ourselves and one another, and provide context for the complex world around us.
“In this moment, it is essential to promote and preserve the humanities as a public good,” said Jacqueline Kellish, vice president for public engagement at the National Humanities Center. “Being Human allows us to share the intellectually rich work of humanities researchers and practitioners across the nation with public audiences in creative, immersive, and accessible ways.”
“We are excited to partner with all of the community researchers and organizations involved in this year’s festival to present a range of events that explore the ways the humanities help us understand and appreciate the world around us,” said Blair LM Kelley, president and director of the National Humanities Center. “This year’s festival, which is organized around the theme of seeing and reading ‘between the lines,’ covers a fascinating variety of events and topics which encourage us to think about how meaning is made when we examine various types of boundaries and spaces—and others in between.”
Established in partnership with the United Kingdom’s Being Human Festival, which originated in 2014, the US edition of the festival is an international expansion of the Being Human effort. Previous Being Human Festival events have taken place in France, Italy, Romania, and Singapore. In 2017, a sister festival was launched in Melbourne, Australia. Being Human continues to grow, with Hong Kong announced as the latest festival hub in 2026.
Events in this year’s Being Human Festival (US) were selected from a wide variety of proposals submitted to the National Humanities Center. Organizers of these events will receive grants, access to instructional sessions and workshops related to publicly engaged humanities work, and other forms of support from the Center.
2026 Being Human Festival (US) Events and Organizers
Northeast
Amherst, MA: WonderPartyEveryone!
Organizers: Mead Art Museum; Jones Library
Midwest
Chicago, IL: A New Public Imaginary for the Calumet River
Organizer: Calumet Heritage Partnership; Southeast Environmental Task Force; Neighbor Space; Friends of the Chicago River; Blue Marble; Green Latinos
Evanston, IL: Beyond the Redline: Fair Housing Exhibition and Walking Tour
Organizer: Open Communities
Lawrence, KS: The Uninvited Guest: An Adaptation of a Maasai Folktale
Organizers: Lawrence Public Library; Department of Theatre & Dance, University of Kansas
Kansas City, MO: Pigment and Politics: A Workshop and Exploration of Luis Quintanilla’s Murals
Organizers: Center for Digital and Public Humanities at University of Missouri-Kansas City; Lincoln College Preparatory Academy; St. Teresa’s Academy; Raytown High School
Kansas City, MO: Routes of Resistance: Black and Indigenous Histories of Kansas City
Organizers: University of Missouri-Kansas City; Black Archives of Mid-America; Mutual Musicians Foundation International; Clay County African American Legacy, Inc.; Banneker School Foundation, Inc.; Western University Association of the AME Church; Wyandot Nation of Kansas, Inc.; Wornall-Majors House Museums; Jackson County Parks & Recreation
Mid-Atlantic
Baltimore, MD: Between the Lines: Memory, Erasure & Reimagining Baltimore Through Chicory Magazine
Organizers: Chicory Revitalization Project; Enoch Pratt Free Library (tentative); City of Baltimore Parks and Recreation for Druid Hill Park (tentative)
Baltimore, MD: I’m Gonna Let it Shine: Praise, Power, and Protest in Black Musical Traditions
Organizers: Curating and Archiving Black Baltimore (CABB—Sheridan Libraries and the Billie Holiday Center for Liberation Arts at Johns Hopkins University); St. James Episcopal Church; Union Baptist Church; Metropolitan United Methodist Church
Brandywine, MD: And Still I Rise: A Black Feminist Cake Social
Organizers: Jasmine Daria Cannon & Orilonise Yarborough
Jersey Shore, NJ: Repair and Repast Cafe
Organizer: Jersey Shore Food Not Bombs
Princeton, NJ: Between Lines and Stanzas: Ways of Being Human with Poetry
Organizers: Princeton Public Library; Public Humanities Initiative at the Princeton Public Library; Princeton University Humanities Council; Princeton French Film Festival
Philadelphia, PA: Ancestral Wisdom for a Weary World
Organizer: DiasporaDNA Story Center
Washington, DC: I ❤️ DC: Arts and Activism Party
Organizers: Matthew Pavesich and Leslie Tellería
South
New Orleans, LA: Between Life and Loss: Deathwork as Community Work
Organizer: Amiyah King, The Afterwords Consulting
Clarksdale, MS: Words on Water: Reading, Reflection, and Journeying on the Mississippi
Organizers: Mississippi Humanities Council; Quapaw Canoe Company
Holly Springs, MS: The Ida B. Wells in Marshall County Tour
Organizers: The Center for the Study of Southern Culture; The Rosa Foundation
Chapel Hill, NC: Storytelling and the Arts: Arab American Poetry and Song
Organizer: UNC Center for Middle East and Islamic Studies
Durham, NC: Afro-Latinos Between the Lines
Organizer: The Department of Language and Literature, North Carolina Central University; Student Engagement and Leadership Office
Denton, TX: Bread and Altars: Braiding Life and Death
Organizers: Texas Woman’s University; University of North Texas
West
Alahambra, CA: Five Flavors: Asian American Food, Sex & Labor
Organizers: Lena Chen; Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions (LACE); Los Angeles Contemporary Archive (LACA); BAD ASIANS
Los Angeles, CA: Himalaya: Tibetan Music, Dance, and Opera
Organizer: Fowler Museum at University of California, Los Angeles
Los Angeles, CA: Living Legends of Drag: Stories of LGBTQ+ Artistry & Culture
Organizers: California LGBT Arts Alliance; One Institute; Drag Arts Lab
About the National Humanities Center
The National Humanities Center is the world’s only independently-funded institute dedicated exclusively to advanced study in the humanities. For nearly five decades, the Center has provided essential research support to scholars, offered innovative professional development for educators, and acted as a vital convener of diverse intellectual communities.
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