Category: Kluge Scholars

The Jungle: Personalizing the Historical Struggle of Workers

An early encounter with muckraking American novelist Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle exposed Kristen Shedd to issues surrounding human rights and animal rights in the early 20th century. For…

History, (Re)imagined

Benedict Anderson’s Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism compelled Alexander Knirim, then a young historian, to re-think the role of imagination in history. Knirim…

Literature and Its Worlds of Possibility

In middle school, Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird inspired Emily Coccia to imagine the possibilities of the law to bring communities closer to justice. In college, it…

The Transformative Power of Dialogue

Growing up in a very small town that once had the most churches per capita in the country, Catherine Newell was around many people who were believers. Moving…