Unearthed
Unearthed is a new multiyear thematic initiative from Indiana Humanities that encourages Hoosiers to discover and discuss their relationships with the natural world. Through engaging speakers, a statewide read, a tour of the Smithsonian’s Water/Ways exhibit, Campfires treks, a film series, a podcast and more, Hoosiers will explore how we shape the environment and how the environment shapes us.
Together, we’ll use the humanities to better understand our actions and interactions. We’ll consider what our state’s environmental history might reveal about its landscape and its people today. We’ll get comfortable with the idea of living in the Anthropocene. And we’ll ask questions like, “Are we being good ancestors?”
We think there will be something for everyone along the way—whether your idea of a good time is going for a long walk in the woods or sitting down with a book.
Program Highlights
Liminal: Indiana at the Anthropocene
Liminal is a meditative aerial film that illustrates our state as a microcosm of this new planetary epoch. It captures features of this global phenomenon within the boundaries of our state, collapsing the global into the local.
Learn more
Dig deeper
This video series features authors, poets and humanists help frame the ideas behind Unearthed and provides a humanities lens to how we shape the environment and how it shapes us.
Watch this video
Waterways Films
Local communities to screen original short films created by Hoosier filmmakers exploring our relationship to water
Now streaming
Unearthed Novel Conversations Collection
In honor of our Unearthed initiative, we’ve created a book collection for the Novel Conversations lending library.
Check it outProgram Details
Environmental Humanities Speakers Bureau
Do you want to have conversations with your neighbors to explore and contemplate the Anthropocene, Indiana’s environmental history, climate change, environmental racism and other topics related to the Unearthed theme? Indiana Humanities has curated a speakers bureau of talks and workshops by Hoosier scholars and experts. From writing haiku inspired by our natural world to conversations about what it means for Hoosiers to be living on indigenous lands, the speakers provide a variety of points of entry to join the statewide conversation.
Chew on This
Chew on This: Are We Being Good Ancestors?
Immunologist Jonas Salk, credited as inventor of the polio vaccine, was perhaps the first to articulate the question “Are We Being Good Ancestors?,” calling it the most important question we can ask ourselves. Knowing what we do about how current technologies and industries will change the environment long after we’re gone, Salk’s question raises a host of others. What will be humanity’s legacy? What do we owe to future generations? How do we make decisions today with consideration to the inhabitants of an unknown future?
On March 29, we asked the question “Are We Being Good Ancestors?” during a special Unearthed-themed Chew on This. In eight locations around the state where we shared a meal and fun, insightful conversation with other curious Hoosiers. Each table was led by an expert facilitator, someone to help us grapple with questions about humanity’s legacy and how to imagine an uncertain future.
How to Survive the Future
How to Survive the Future is a podcast created by Alex Chambers and Allison Quantz in partnership with Indiana Humanities. Listening parties will be hosted for each of the five episodes.
Campfires
Indiana Humanities has been hosting Campfires across Indiana since 2016 and will continue to invite Hoosiers to explore the connections between literature, nature and the future of Indiana in conjunction with Unearthed.
INconversation
Indiana Humanities’ INconversation engages an intimate group in interesting and insightful conversations with some of the nation’s most intriguing thought-leaders. This highly participatory question-and-answer style discussion involves the thought leader, a moderator and the audience. INconversation is a signature program of Indiana Humanities.
Upcoming INconversations
Summer 2023: INconversation with Robin Wall Kimmerer
Liminal Film Tour
Events
Explore These Five Guiding Questions
How do we shape our environment, and how does our environment shape us?
What does Hoosier environmental history reveal about Indiana’s landscape and its people today?
How can the humanities help us understand our relationship with the natural world?
How does our understanding of nature affect our actions toward the environment?
How is environmental change impacting our understanding of humanity’s legacy? Are we being good ancestors?
Why we chose this theme
Senior Program Manager Megan Telligman shares why we chose Unearthed as our next thematic initiative and why the environmental humanities are important for our current moment.
Read morePrevious Unearthed Programs
INCONVERSATION
Indiana Humanities’ INconversation engages an intimate group in interesting and insightful conversations with some of the nation’s most intriguing thought-leaders. This highly participatory question-and-answer style discussion involves the thought leader, a moderator and the audience. INconversation is a signature program of Indiana Humanities.
Previous INconversations
June 29, 2022: INconversation with Vann R. Newkirk II (Watch the Video)
Waterways Films
In 2022, Indiana Humanities hosted a 10-city film tour featuring six short documentary films about Indiana’s waterways. From improving the health of the Blue River to support the hellbender salamander habitat to the fading art of net making, the films explore issues of access and conservation, as well as the unique cultures that spring up around Indiana’s waterways. You can now watch five of the six films on our website.
Water/Ways
Indiana Humanities will sponsor a tour of the Smithsonian’s Water/Ways exhibit during the first year of the Unearthed theme.
Six communities will host the exhibit for six weeks each and will receive extensive training, funding and other resources from the expert staffs of the Smithsonian and Indiana Humanities. Each of the six hosts will also curate a unique section of the exhibit that explores their community’s relationship to water.
As part of the Indiana tour, Water/Ways will visit the following communities during 2021 and 2022.
North Webster Public Library (North Webster): June 26, 2021–August 7, 2021
La Porte County Soil and Water Conservation District / La Porte County Public Library (Rolling Prairie): August 14, 2021–September 26, 2021
University of Southern Indiana/Historic New Harmony (New Harmony): October 2, 2021–November 14, 2021
Riverscape/Wabash River Development and Beautification, Inc. (West Terre Haute): November 20, 2021–December 30, 2021
Jefferson County Public Library (Madison): January 8, 2022–February 20, 2022
Cope Environmental Center (Centerville): February 26, 2022–April 10, 2022
Cedar Lake Historical Association (Cedar Lake): April 15-May 22
Carnegie Public Library of Steuben County (Angola): May 28-July 17
Culver Union Township Public Library (Culver): July 23-Sept. 4
Switzerland County Tourism Office (Vevay): Sept. 10-Oct. 23
Benton County Soil & Water Conservation / Otterbein Public Library (Benton Co.): Oct. 29-Dec. 11
Statewide Read
Indiana Humanities’ One State / One Story program invites Hoosiers to engage deeply with a book as part of a statewide conversation tied to the themes of Unearthed. We awarded grants to host a community read of World of Wonders by Aimee Nezhukumatathil selection to organizations around the state.
Questions?
Contact Megan Telligman, Senior Program Manager:
mtelligman@indianahumanities.org | 317.616.9409