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To commemmorate our 50th anniversary in 2024, we produced a series of short documentaries to explore our archive of programs, grants, and public events.
The first film in our series, Rural by Choice, explores the complexities of rural identity. Documentarian Lawrence Hott explains how, in 1981, he received a grant from Mass Humanities to support a film he was making about urban/rural tensions surrounding the Quabbin Reservoir in western Massachusetts. The second half of Rural by Choice illustrates how those same tensions are still at work, more than 40 years later, in rural communities like Essex. KD Montgomery, the executive director of the Essex Shipbuilding Museum, explains how residents came together to celebrate their rural values when the museum hosted the Smithsonian’s Crossroads: Change in Rural America exhibit in 2022.
In 1986, Mass Humanities began to implement its first statewide project. Shifting Gears: The Changing Meaning of Work in Massachusetts, 1920-1980, gathered oral histories from blue collar workers in once-prosperous manufacturing towns. In 2021, Mass Humanities awarded an Expand Massachusetts Stories grant to the Friends of Lawrence Heritage State Park. They used the funds to produce Somos Latinos: Our Journey to Lawrence and Beyond. This exhibit adds onto the public history of Lawrence by capturing the stories, voices, and experiences of Latino immigrants living in the city.
Supporting the public humanities in Massachusetts enables us to amplify incredible stories like the ones you see here.
The Speech is the Star examines the explosion in popularity of the Reading Frederick Douglass Together program, from its first reading in 2009 to the 60+ readings that took place in 2024. Douglass readings have become a staple around the commonwealth, especially at Juneteenth celebrations. In 2023, Mass Humanities published a trauma-informed set of guidelines to help communities address racial trauma.
Reliquary of Blackness explores the little-known Black history of Holyoke.
Dig deeper into our work and the history of the public humanities in Massachusetts by visiting our YouTube channel.
Mass Humanities
66 Bridge Street,
Northampton, MA 01060
Mass Humanities
66 Bridge Street,
Northampton, MA 01060
