In this audio recording, graduate student Margherita Berti describes how an ordinary encounter while studying abroad gave her a new outlook on cultural differences, practices, and perspectives. Transcript My Humanities Moment goes back to when I was an exchange student in high school in 2008/2009. I lived for a year in Indiana with an American … Continued
Graduate student Justina Licata explains how a junior high school teacher’s passion and influence led her to embrace the study of history as a lifelong vocation. Transcript Hello, my name is Justina Licata, and I am a Ph.D. student studying history at UNC-G. And my humanities moment relates to how I became a history major … Continued
In this audio recording, graduate student Jingyi Li describes how a late twentieth-century academic study of the book in Japan upended her expectations by rejecting the Eurocentric and Orientalist bias of many comparable scholarly works. Her experience with this text inspired her to move beyond her own linguistic insecurities and to continue with her research … Continued
Davidson traces an arc through her life story which began when a fifth-grade teacher gave her a copy of the novel Dragonsong by Anne McCaffrey. This gesture, combined with the bold and self-affirming nature of a novel featuring a determined young female protagonist, gave Davidson the strength and conviction to surpass her own expectations of … Continued
Crawford recalls how a potentially traumatic move to a new high school at the age of fourteen could have been a distressing experience, but ultimately showed him the power of community, acceptance, and music.
My Humanities Moment starts off years before I became a teacher, but it culminated when I realized what my ultimately mission was as a teacher. When I grew up, I was a very poor student, and there were many reasons why (poverty-level upbringing, broken home, alcoholic parent, mentally-handicapped parent, poorly identified learning disabilities, etc…). most … Continued
“Because a warrior carries helmet and breastplate for his own protection, but his shield for the safety of the whole line.” ― Steven Pressfield, Gates of Fire Like many parents, I have always felt like I am my families shield. It was not until I read this novel that I understood the importance of that … Continued
Author, educational advocate, and entrepreneur David Bruce Smith recounts how his passion for reading biographies as a child instilled in him an enduring love of history and allowed him to overcome scholastic pressures he faced to deviate from his intellectual path. This exercise also connected him more strongly to a shared literary tradition within his … Continued
Author, educational advocate, and entrepreneur David Bruce Smith discusses a transformational moment in his education, during which a high school teacher showed him the revelatory truth that history, at its core, is a collection of stories and gossip. Smith believes strongly that by presenting history to students as a series of exciting and illuminating stories, … Continued
As a teacher of classical mythology, Poliakoff explains that the challenge he presents to his students—and that myths present to contemporary readers—is to understand how such ancient stories transcend their particular contexts to embody universal lessons which can be translated across cultures and history. By using classical mythology both to understand our origins and to … Continued