NEH Overview

What is NEH?

The National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) is an independent federal agency created in 1965. It is one of the largest funders of humanities programs in the United States. To visit NEH's Web site, click here.

What does NEH do?

Because democracy demands wisdom, the National Endowment for the Humanities serves and strengthens our Republic by promoting excellence in the humanities and conveying the lessons of history to all Americans. The Endowment accomplishes this mission by providing grants for high-quality humanities projects in four funding areas: preserving and providing access to cultural resources, education, research, and public programs.

NEH grants typically go to cultural institutions, such as museums, archives, libraries, colleges, universities, public television, and radio stations, and to individual scholars. The grants:

• strengthen teaching and learning in the humanities in schools and colleges across the nation • facilitate research and original scholarship • provide opportunities for lifelong learning • preserve and provide access to cultural and educational resources • strengthen the institutional base of the humanities

What projects has NEH supported?

Since 1965, the Endowment has opened new worlds of learning for the American public with noteworthy projects such as:

• "Treasures of Tutankhamen," the blockbuster exhibition seen by more than 1.5 million people • The Civil War, the landmark documentary by Ken Burns viewed by 38 million Americans • Library of America, editions of novels, essays, and poems celebrating America's literary heritage • United States Newspaper Project, an effort to catalog and microfilm 63.3 million pages of newspapers dating from the early Republic • Fifteen Pulitzer prize-winning books, including those by James M. McPherson, Louis Menand, Joan D. Hedrick, and Bernard Bailyn

What are the humanities?

According to the 1965 National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act, "The term 'humanities' includes, but is not limited to, the study of the following: language, both modern and classical; linguistics; literature; history; jurisprudence; philosophy; archaeology; comparative religion; ethics; the history, criticism and theory of the arts; those aspects of social sciences which have humanistic content and employ humanistic methods; and the study and application of the humanities to the human environment with particular attention to reflecting our diverse heritage, traditions, and history and to the relevance of the humanities to the current conditions of national life."

How is NEH structured?

The Endowment is directed by a chairman, who is appointed by the president and confirmed by the U.S. Senate, for a term of four years. Advising the chairman is the National Council on the Humanities, a board of 26 distinguished private citizens who are also appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate. The National Council members serve staggered six- year terms.

NEH Chairman Jim Leach was nominated by President in July 2009 and confirmed by the Senate in early August. He began his term as the ninth NEH Chairman on August 12, 2009. Leach previously served 30 years representing southeastern Iowa in the U.S. House of Representatives, where he chaired the Banking and Financial Services Committee, the Subcommittee on Asian and Pacific Affairs, the Congressional-Executive Commission on China, and founded and co-chaired the Congressional Humanities Caucus. A brief biography of the NEH Chairman is available by clicking here.

DIVISIONS AND OFFICES that administer NEH grant programs

Grant programs offered by the National Endowment for the Humanities are administered by divisions and offices that work with prospective applicants, recruit and oversee peer-review panels, provide analysis of panel results to members of the National Council on the Humanities and the agency’s senior staff, conduct site visits of projects that have received NEH support, and represent NEH at regional, national, and international conferences in the humanities. Additional information about each of these divisions and offices is available via the links below. • Division of Education Programs • Division of Preservation and Access • Division of Public Programs • Division of Research Programs • Federal/State Partnership • Office of Challenge Grants • Office of Digital Humanities

NEH grants support a wide range of humanities activities through different divisions and offices. To get a sense of these different activities, and the divisions and offices that sponsor them, consider some of the following possibilities.

If you are seeking to

• raise money to build the capacity of your home institution to support humanities activities, including enhancement of the infrastructure for the digital humanities, you should look at the programs offered by the Office of Challenge Grants; • explore ways of applying digital technologies to the humanities, you should look at the programs offered by the Office of Digital Humanities, the Division of Education Programs, the Division of Preservation and Access, the Division of Public Programs, and the Division of Research Programs; • enhance your classroom teaching by obtaining advanced training in humanities subjects, or to train teachers to enhance their classroom teaching of humanities subjects, you should look at the programs offered by the Division of Education Programs; • preserve collections of and enhance access to humanities materials, you should look at the programs offered by the Division of Preservation and Access; • provide advanced training in preservation methods and materials, you should look at the programs offered by the Division of Preservation and Access; • develop a reference work or research tool, you should look at the programs offered by the Division of Preservation and Access and the Division of Research Programs; • plan or implement an exhibition or interpretative program at a cultural institution, or to host a traveling exhibition at a library, you should look at the programs offered by the Division of Public Programs; • develop or produce a radio or television broadcast or a digitally delivered program about a humanities subject, you should look at the programs offered by the Division of Public Programs; • conduct research on a humanities subject, you should look at the programs offered by the Division of Research Programs; • improve humanities teaching or conduct humanities research at a Historically Black College or University, an Institution with High Hispanic Enrollment, or a Tribal College or University, you should look at programs offered by the Division of Education Programs and the Division of Research Programs.

JIM LEACH

Chairman Jim Leach is the ninth Chairman of the National Endowment for the Humanities. Nominated by President Barack Obama on July 9, 2009, and confirmed by the Senate in early August, Leach began his four-year term as NEH Chairman on August 12, 2009. Leach previously served 30 years representing southeastern Iowa in the U.S. House of Representatives, where he chaired the Banking and Financial Services Committee, the Subcommittee on Asian and Pacific Affairs, the Congressional-Executive Commission on China, and founded and co-chaired the Congressional —NEH photo by Greg Powers and Humanities Caucus. Audrey Crewe After leaving Congress in 2007, Leach joined the faculty at Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson School, where he was the John L. Weinberg Visiting Professor of Public and International Affairs until his confirmation as NEH chairman. In September 2007, Leach took a year’s leave of absence from Princeton to serve as interim director of the Institute of Politics and lecturer at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. Leach graduated from Princeton University, received a Master of Arts degree in Soviet politics from the School of Advanced International Studies at The John Hopkins University, and did additional graduate studies at the London School of Economics. Leach holds eight honorary degrees and has received numerous awards, including the Sidney R. Yates Award for Distinguished Public Service to the Humanities from the National Humanities Alliance; the Woodrow Wilson Award from The Johns Hopkins University; the Adlai Stevenson Award from the United Nations Association; the Edgar Wayburn Award from the Sierra Club; the Wayne Morse Integrity in Politics Award; the Norman Borlaug Award for Public Service; and the Wesley Award for Service to Humanity. A three-sport athlete in college, Leach was elected to the Wrestling Hall of Fame in Stillwater, Oklahoma, and the International Wrestling Hall of Fame in Waterloo, Iowa. Leach resides in Iowa City and the , D.C., area with his wife Elisabeth (Deba), son Gallagher, and daughter Jenny.

National Council on the Humanities

Rolena Adorno Adele Logan Alexander New Haven, Connecticut Washington, D.C. Albert J. Beveridge Allison Blakely Washington, D.C. , Constance M. Carroll Jamsheed K. Choksy San Diego, Greenwood, Indiana Cathy N. Davidson Dawn Ho Delbanco Durham, North Carolina , New York Jane Marie (Jamie) Doggett Paula Barker Duffy White Sulfur Springs, Montana Chicago, Illinois Jean Bethke Elshtain Gary D. Glenn Chicago, Illinois DeKalb, Illinois Allen Guelzo Mary Habeck Gettysburg, Pennsylvania Washington, D.C. David Michael Hertz Marvin Krislov Bloomington, Indiana Oberlin, Ohio Iris Cornelia Love Wilfred M. McClay Lincoln, Vermont Chattanooga, Tennessee Ricardo J. Quinones Carol M. Swain Claremont, California Nashville, Tennessee Martha Wagner Weinberg Kenneth R. Weinstein Boston, Massachusetts Washington, D.C. Jay Winik Chevy Chase, Maryland

STAFF

For a complete list of NEH Staff, visit www.neh.gov