On Wednesday, January 19th, Poetry in America host Elisa New was interviewed by Steve Goldstein for KJZZ (NPR Phoenix). Goldstein and New discuss what the broad term “humanities” means, and how that relates to Professor New’s mission leading the new Center for the Public Humanities at Arizona State University (ASU). 

As New defines it, the humanities are “that set of disciplines where we think about what it means to be a human being.” Her humanistic mission is empowering all students, even those who “may be freaked out by their high school English class or think they don’t understand the paintings in a museum,” to be confident that they can be “involved in the arts in some way.” For Professor New, ASU’s mission allows her to unite her humanities with her humanism, to not only teach literature in the baroque halls of the Ivy League, but to the benefit of the widest possible audience.