Grant Summary
$4,540 planning grant over 7 months. The New York Public Library, in partnership with the Center for the Humanities located at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York, will use its planning grant from the Teagle Foundation to prepare for a Teagle Forum on Poetry. The goal of the Forum is to stimulate new and challenging discussions about the study of poetry as part of a liberal education and to broaden awareness so that the Library's world-renowned collections can be explored, exploited, and discovered by a new generation of liberal arts scholars. With funding from The Teagle Foundation, the Library will spend seven months conducting research into how poetry is taught at the undergraduate level around the country, what courses and programs are currently being offered, and how to use the energy around poetry to stimulate further interest in the humanities; brainstorming with undergraduate faculty to engage them in the planning process; and discussing ideas with poets. Plans presently call for the Teagle Forum on Poetry to feature a prominent poet as the main speaker, to discuss the primacy of poetry in the humanities and to liberal education, and will be followed up by two or three panel discussions, chaired by scholars selected from the CUNY faculty. (Final Forum format will be determined after research and planning is complete.) The Library and CUNY will promote the Forum to a broad audience, including students, educators, scholars, and the general public. The main Forum and panels, along with feedback from the audience, will be written up as a series of essays and submitted to The Teagle Foundation to be published on its website. The Library and CUNY are also interested in publishing substantial portions of the content on their websites. In this way, scholars who are unable to attend the talks themselves would be able to review the content of the event.