Call for Proposals: “Medical Humanities: Bodies and Ethics”
Spring 2026 Symposium
Health, wellness, and illness are not just biological facts, but culturally shaped phenomena. The 2026 New Hampshire Humanities Collaborative (NHHC) Spring Symposium will focus on the humanities and the implications of science, technology, and medicine. The UNH College of Liberal Arts and the NHHC invites proposals for spring 2026 course engagement with the theme “Medical Humanities.” Medical humanities are dedicated to exploring illness, health, healthcare, the body, and the mind within specific social, cultural, and historical contexts. The goal of the symposium is to challenge students to examine the origins and nature of beliefs and values about bodies, illness, and health as well as those embedded in society’s social, cultural, educational, legal, and political institutions. Participants will examine the role, effect, and influence of science and technology in our lives, our societies, and in human well-being.
Participants will integrate the “medical humanities” theme into their course content, create and share an assignment around the theme, and contribute to a culminating event on Friday, April 10, 2026, at The Millyard in Manchester. Transportation and refreshments will be provided.
Successful applicants will receive a $1500 faculty stipend which increases to $3000 for collaboration with a Community College System of New Hampshire (CCSNH) faculty/class. After the Symposium, an additional $500 will be available for faculty to further develop their assignment into a shareable unit suitable for CCSNH/STEM courses. Proposals may also include a project budget of up to $500. All full-time COLA faculty are eligible to apply.
To workshop proposals and potential UNH/CCSNH collaboration, NHHC is hosting a luncheon on November 14, 2025, from 1:00-2:00 pm in Hamilton Smith 130. Attendance is strongly encouraged but not required. Please RSVP by November 10th: https://unh.az1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_5tlM1ubrCwJtim2
Faculty participants will:
- Attend the Winter Academy, January 8, 2026 10:00-11:30 (online via Teams) to develop ideas and foster partnerships between faculty from UNH and CCSNH
- Incorporate the symposium theme into a course syllabus/learning assignment resulting in student/class deliverables culminating in student presentations at the 2026 Spring Symposium
- Attend the 2026 Spring Symposium (along with at least 5 students)
- Develop a sharable course unit (via Canvas Commons) on medical humanities
UNH proposals are due December 8, 2025 and should be sent to Alynna.Lyon@unh.edu.
Proposals Guidelines:
Proposals should be 1-2 pages and include:
- Project abstract that includes summary of theme inclusion, name of course to modify and changes to class content, assignments, assessments, or delivery methods
- Proposal for student outputs/deliverables and potential types of presentations at the April symposium
- List of potential collaborations (if relevant)
- Itemized budget including rationale
Outputs/deliverables may take the form of curriculum units, student presentations, co-creations between students and/or faculty, collaborative research, digital media, events, and other community outreach projects. Artistic expressions, written works, interdisciplinarity/ transdisciplinary projects and visual and performance-based projects are welcome. A pop-up gallery space will be available to showcase arts-based projects.
Evaluation Criteria:
- Rigorous and robust engagement with the “medical humanities” theme
- Support of the NHHC mission (see https://cola.unh.edu/new-hampshire-humanities-collaborative/about-nhcc)
- Feasibility of the budget
- Potential impact of the project and potential for a sharable Canvas unit (including, if appropriate, the number of students served and timeframe)
- Level of cross-campus engagement and collaboration and/or interdisciplinarity/transdisciplinary focus
Examples of Medical Humanities topics include:
- Cross-cultural and comparative studies of health and illness
- How religious and ethical perspectives influence thinking about medicine and health
- Critical thinking about equity, access, and resource distribution of health services and medicine
Discipline specific examples:
- Art and Literature: How is medicine and health depicted, contested, and sustained through visual and written mediums?
- Music and Art: What is the role of music and art in healing processes?
- History and Classics: How have ideas around medicine, health and technology been treated historically, and how do they influence our understanding today?
- Architecture and Design: How do we understand and envision medicine and health in “place and space”? How do public spaces support health and well-being or vice versa, how do space and place harm human health?
- Design and Psychology: How do we design a therapeutic space?
- Disability Justice: What is the relationship between accessibility and the questions of medical humanities?
- Language and Culture: How do different cultures/languages (present and historical) create and interpret conceptions of health and medicine?
- Music and Performance Art: How do we explore, portray, interpret, and reveal understanding and conceptions of medicine and health, both individually and collectively?
- Music and Art: What is the role of music and art in healing processes?
- Science, Technology, and Society: How does changing technology influence understanding of community and communities? In what ways is technology a threat, and in what ways is it an enhancement of medicine and health? Will technological innovations like regenerative medicine (RM) and AI reshape human agency?
- Mathematics and Science: How do the disciplines of math and science establish, test, and support claims about medicine and health?
- Social Sciences: How do different social science disciplines test and measure claims about medicine and health? Is there opportunity for greater interdisciplinary collaboration in refining our understanding of health and ill-health?
- Social Sciences: How do justice and legal systems shape health and medicine? Who are the primary authors of narratives regarding "health” or “medicine” and to what extent do narratives celebrate or undermine human liberation and equality?
- Music/dance performances, art compositions, demonstrations, etc., are also encouraged.
- Individual students with relevant interests and projects are welcome to apply independent of specific academic courses (with a faculty mentor).
We are excited to again offer the January Research Opportunity Program (JROP) – a competitive grant program for undergraduate students for exploratory research or artistic activity on social inequality undertaken during J-term 2026.
Any student majoring in the College of Liberal Arts may apply for a JROP award for work undertaken at a site of their choice during J-term (in Durham or at some other geographical location). Students must be in good academic standing (expected minimum cumulative GPA of 2.0 at the end of the Fall 2025 semester) to apply. Funded students will be paid an award of $850. Past recipients of JROP awards will not be eligible for consideration.
How to Apply
To apply, please email paul.robertson@unh.edu a 2-page outline of the intended activity (exploratory research or artistic activity); your motivation for embarking on the intended project; its thematic relevance to social inequality; how you anticipate spending your time doing the research (approx. how many hours a week you anticipate over the J-term [four weeks]); and the location(s) where the work will be done. All proposals will be reviewed by the NHHC team, and up to 10 students will be funded for J-term 2026.
We welcome proposals working with a specific faculty mentor in COLA. If you don’t have a specific faculty member in mind, please submit your proposal and, if awarded a JROP stipend, we will pair you with an appropriate faculty mentor!
Deadline
Submissions due by: November 7, 2025
