Today, Dean Shannon Miller made public my move into being the Director of Public Programming for the College of Humanities and the Arts at San Jose State University. It’s a big, bold move, but the work really encompasses what we’ve already been doing with our live event programming initiative for the last 3 years. It’s taken a Dean with a BIG VISION to see the possibilities for pumping up current initiatives through Public Humanities and Digital Humanities methods.
I build infrastructure. I do project management. I connect people and projects. So, yeah, Digital Humanities writ large.
This means that I read as much as possible and as broadly as possible on our campus. This works because I stayed at SJSU for my entire career, sat on the very active Academic Senate, networked on committees that aligned with my values and career trajectory, taught classes that looked outward, embraced digital methods that put me squarely in Digital Humanities and then Digital Pedagogy, and listened.
I’ve learned to listen in order to amplify a faculty member’s excitement around a project. To foster a connection between a cool project or person in, say, World Languages to a cool project or person in Geography.
And, I get to continue to learn about the wide array of expertise all over our campus. And, learn about how to ensure that we’re making space for and celebrating underrepresented voices.
This all started because my dad, while a graduate student at UT Austin library school & cataloguer for the not-yet-open Ransom Center, took me to Half Price Books every month and turned me loose to smell all the paperbacks of possibility.
The official announcement: Director of Public Programming
Sent on behalf of Dean Shannon Miller (April 14, 2021)
Dear H&A Faculty and Staff,
I am delighted to announce that, starting in Fall 2021, Dr. Katherine Harris will serve as Director of Public Programming for the College of Humanities and the Arts. In this role, Professor Harris will extend her previous role providing support to Artistic Excellence Programming Grant (AEPG) faculty participants and applicants. This new role will allow her to also support cross-disciplinary collaboration between and curricular integration of these events into COHA classrooms. Additionally, she will facilitate and expand community engagement across San Jose and the South Bay through our rich AEPG events and through other appropriate programming. As Director of Public Programming, Professor Harris’ role will include pursuing grant-writing opportunities to extend the reach of the AEPG programming as well as build sustainable infrastructure around an already very successful program. Additional grant resources will allow the College of H & A to increase the amount of student-centered and community-engaged programming currently offered by AEPG. In addition, the Director of Public Programming will work to deepen the connections between these events and curricular activities by building bridges between CoHA and other academic units at San Jose State University. The Director of Public Programming will also work to increase the community’s engagement with our current programming as well as facilitating more work with community partners throughout the region.
Professor Harris will thus continue and extend the consultative role she has been playing around College of H & A Public Programming as we build out more curricular integration within and beyond the College. I am very excited about what we can all accomplish together with her investment in extending the reach of our exciting arts and humanities programs and events. I am confident that we can build a nationally-recognized program of the Arts and Humanities in Action as a result!
Dean
College of Humanities & the Arts | San José State University
One Washington Square | San José, CA 95192- 0088
Let’s get to work….
triproftri 
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