In 2004, Uday Sukhatme, then Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, issued a call for proposals for Centers of Excellence to the thirty departments and programs that constitute CAS to identify programs with significant potential to raise the research profile of the university, and with the potential to generate a significant amount of external funding to further their core missions. The Humanities Institute emerged as one of the ten Centers from the College.

Dr. Ewa Plonowska Ziarek was chosen to be the first Director of the newly created Institute, along with Dr. Martha Malamud serving as Executive Director.

Ewa Ziarek and Martha Malamud

Photo by Eric Frick

In the last two years, the University at Buffalo Humanities Institute has launched a range of academic and cultural initiatives in collaboration with partners on and off campus. Attendance at major HI events, both on and off campus, has exceeded expectations. The total number of people attending HI events as of April 26, 2006, was over 10,000, showing that there is an eager audience for stimulating programs in the humanities at UB and in the Greater Buffalo area.

The academic and cultural initiatives spring from UB's specific strengths in the humanities and contribute to the region's cultural life, enhancing its growing reputation as a significant artistic and intellectual center (Buffalo was voted #1 arts city among mid-sized U.S. cities in the annual poll conducted by American Style in 2006).

"On the Front Lines:

Journalists Challenge the New Censorship" 

September 30, 2006 

Buffalo and Erie County Public Library