Integrating Art/Literature, Science, and Public Policy Public Lecture and Faculty Workshop

February 5, 2024, 10:00 am - 1:00 pm

Bill Moore Student Success Center, Clary Theatre and Savant Building, Room 115

Public Lecture – "A Humanist in the World of Genomics: Privacy, Big Data, and Science Policy"

Bill Moore Student Success Center, Clary Theatre | 10 – 11 a.m.

How can humanists successfully compete for NIH funding? What roles can the humanities play in the public sphere? How can we influence public policy around issues ranging from genomics and neuroscience to AI and the environment? Drawing on his experience as site-PI on two collaborative NIH grants totaling more than $8 million, as former director of a center focused on the role of the arts in shaping public policy, as a participant in projects with the National Academy of Medicine, Personal Genome Project, and Broad Institute, and author of Literature, Science, and Public Policy: From Darwin to Genomics (Cambridge, 2023), Jay Clayton will outline answers that have worked at his institution and other universities.

Open to all students, staff, and faculty. Co-sponsored by the Schools of Literature, Media, and Communication; Modern Languages; and Public Policy. RSVP required. 

Faculty Workshop – “Engaging Students in Collaborative Research with Humanities Faculty”

Savant Building, Room 115 | 11:30 a.m. – 1 p.m.

This workshop explores new models of humanities research focused on transdisciplinary collaboration. Over the last five years, Jay Clayton and his team of undergraduate and graduate students in the humanities and social sciences have published 24 articles in peer-reviewed publications on topics ranging from literature to television medical dramas to science fiction films. Clayton will describe the process involved, discussing methods that foster vertical integration of research and mentorship.

Open to only faculty. Co-sponsored by the Schools of Literature, Media, and Communication; Modern Languages; and Public Policy. RSVP required. 

About Jay Clayton

Jay Clayton is a professor of cinema and media arts, and communication of science, engineering, and technology at Vanderbilt, and the director of the Vanderbilt Curb Center for Art, Enterprise, and Public Policy.

His most recent book with Cambridge UP, Literature, Science, and Public Policy: From Darwin to Genomics, "shows how literature can influence public policy concerning scientific controversies in genetics and other areas. Literature brings unique insights to issues involving cloning, GMOs, gene editing, and more by dramatizing their full human complexity. Literature's value for public policy is demonstrated by striking examples that range from the literary response to evolution in the Victorian era through the modern synthesis of evolution and genetics in the mid-twentieth century to present-day genomics. Outlining practical steps for humanists who want to help shape public policy, this book offers vivid readings of novels by H. G. Wells, H. Rider Haggard, Aldous Huxley, Robert Heinlein, Octavia Butler, Samuel R. Delany, David Mitchell, Margaret Atwood, Ian McEwan, Kazuo Ishiguro, Gary Shteyngart, and others that illustrate the important insights that literary studies can bring to debates about science and society.    

Other recent work includes empirical research on the relationship between movies and TV series and public policy debates, for example, attitudes towards genetics.