The 2021 ACLS Annual Meeting was held on April 22 and 23 via Zoom. While the meeting was again presented on a virtual platform, ACLS was still able to return to a fuller agenda of discussion panels with member societies, fellows, and featured guests.

President Joy Connolly’s Report to the Council emphasized a need for community and collective action to advance the humanities and interpretive social sciences, as well as reform in the academy, and the unique position ACLS is in to foster this collaboration between scholars, member societies, universities, and the public.

Her remarks highlighted new ACLS programs and initiatives from the past year, including the public programming series “Humanistic Scholarship in the 21st Century,” which launched with a year-long series of events focused on Black and Brown scholars in the United States; the development of spaces to collaborate on pressing issues in higher education through the Design Workshop for a New Academy and the Intention Foundry; and increased opportunities for early career scholars with the Emerging Voices Fellowship and Leading Edge Fellowship programs, as well as updated eligibility for the ACLS Fellowship program to focus on new PhDs and non-tenured scholars.

Other sessions included: