[Special Issue] Bridging the Public and Humanities
The Division of Cultural Studies (under the Department of Cultural and Religious Studies) at the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) will welcome students to our new undergraduate programme in Public Humanities from AY2025-26. While Public Humanities as a field has existed in American universities like Brown, Yale, and NYU for many years, this new BA in Public Humanities programme at CUHK represents the first academic programme of its kind in Hong Kong, and quite possibly in Asia. This development has definitely raised curiosity and concerns among various stakeholders in Hong Kong and the region, as many may wonder what exactly Public Humanities is.
Essentially, Public Humanities is about bridging the arts and culture with diverse publics and engaging with grounded societal issues. As the current director of the MA in Cultural Management (MACM) programme at CUHK, I see strong parallels between the mission and vision of this new programme and what the MACM has been doing for the past many years.
The MACM programme at CUHK has been around for over 23 years, and since day one, we have been under Cultural Studies, not the Business School or Fine Arts Department. Needless to say, this connection to Cultural Studies has shaped our approach towards Cultural Management. The MACM programme recognizes cultural management as more than just the application of technical skills or managerial know-how. It’s an act of cultural mediation – an engagement with the ethical, social, and cultural dynamics that underpin the arts and culture. Our students learn to interpret, communicate, and advocate for the cultural rights, dignity, and values of all members of society. We have long been concerned with how the arts intersect with the public, and have always advocated the ‘doing’ of Cultural Studies.
My predecessor, Oscar Ho, initiated the annual “Forum on Community Arts” from 2014 to 2020. These forums explored the relationships between arts and communities, debating on issues such as Heritage, Aging, Healing, and more. Alongside this forum, I launched a community arts festival under the MACM programme that ran for seven years, focusing on societal topics such as homelessness, LGBTQ+ rights, marginalized heritage, underprivileged children, and aging issues.
Thanks to Oscar, the MACM programme has a strong relationship with Brown University’s Public Humanities, leading to long-term collaborative projects and internships for our students. When I took over as director in 2021, I was able to continue this relationship and invited Dietrich Neumann, the Director of (then) John Nicholas Brown Center for Public Humanities and Cultural Heritage, to CUHK as a Visiting Professor in AY2022-23. During his stay, he led the publication project “Guide to Public Art at CUHK”, introducing 34 public artworks on our campus.
In recent years, my work in the Division of Cultural Studies has focused heavily on aging, and I launched the “Arts and Aging Project” in 2021. This initiative began with two forums on “Art and Social Change” in 2021 and 2022, followed by a series of projects that brought the arts into the lives of seniors in Hong Kong. We collaborated with Men of Winds, a senior wind-band group, to co-organize the “Winds of Change” concert. We also produced 11 short documentary films that showcased the artistic journeys of seniors in Hong Kong. These films were first shown in Jockey Club Creative Arts Centre. Subsequently, we brought the films to elderly centres in Tai Po District, with the intention of motivating seniors to engage with the arts. The films worked, and we managed to attract a group of seniors from Tai Po to participate in two drama workshops we organized. Many of these seniors had never participated in drama (or the arts) prior to our workshops. We are also developing an open-access arts resource hub to support seniors in Hong Kong and other Cantonese-speaking regions in taking their first steps in the arts.
Although Public Humanities is a new programme at CUHK, the essence of it is not. I believe our projects and activities these years have laid a strong foundation for this new academic path. To me, Public Humanities represents both an expansion and extension of Cultural Studies and Cultural Management. It takes a more hands-on, grounded approach to cultural studies while also emphasizing the importance of critical thinking and theoretical frameworks in cultural management.
As a four-year undergraduate programme, Public Humanities is well placed to provide students the opportunity to explore both the depth and breadth of the field. And for those who wish to continue their studies, the MA in Cultural Management and the MA in Intercultural Studies programmes within the Division of Cultural Studies provide clear progression pathways forward.
It is time we build stronger bridges between the arts, culture, and the larger public, one public at a time. I believe this is what the new Public Humanities programme aims to achieve.
Benny
Benny Lim is the Associate Professor of Practice in Cultural Management and the Director of the MA in Cultural Management Programme at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. Visit https://www2.crs.cuhk.edu.hk/faculty-staff/teaching-faculty/lim-kok-wai-benny
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