Story & Place + CU: Humanities Open House
In this series, HRI Director Antoinette Burton explores the 2025–26 theme “Story & Place” as it connects or intersects with the Champaign-Urbana community.
At the first ever Humanities Open House, the Humanities are in Motion!
On Saturday, October 4th, you’ll have the chance to experience something unprecedented right here in Champaign-Urbana: the first Humanities Open House at the University of Illinois.
When you think of “Illinois” and “Open House” on campus, the first thing that probably comes to mind is the annual Engineering Open House, where you can see rocket demos in the open air every spring.
And, if you’ve had or been around little kids in the last twenty years, you probably know about the fistulated cow that’s on display at the Vet Med Open House every fall.
You may have even ventured to put your arm inside to feel the cow’s stomach compartment.
Each of these events has been running for many years. They are part of our community identity—part of the story of C-U as a place with a world class public research university.
In 2025, humanists at Illinois are eager to spotlight how we too are part of the story of this place.
Like Grainger and ACES, the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, which is the home of the majority of humanities majors and minors, is key to this story.
But we’re not limiting October 4th to the energies of LAS alone.
Because the humanities is so networked, and so central to student life and opportunity at Illinois, this first Humanities Open House is a partnership between the biggest college on campus, the largest public University Library in the country, and the liveliest hub of humanities activity on campus, the Humanities Research Institute.
The day’s events will open with a resource fair featuring 30 tables with information about humanities courses, majors, minors, student organizations, and career and other services. Participants can learn more in hands-on departmental and library activities, take in live performances, and hear from alumni who have their own humanities stories to tell.
You may be wondering, why Humanities Open House now?
We live in a rapidly accelerating world of technological innovation and change. A.I. and ChatGPT are in everyone’s minds and at their fingertips.
They grab a lot of headlines, and rightly so.
But the humanities are constantly moving and changing as well.
Rooted in established subject areas like literature, history, philosophy, and religion, humanists prize books and archives and sacred texts from all traditions and all parts of the world.
But they also bring the work they do alive in unexpected ways.
You’ll be surprised and amazed by how humanities students use tech. Check out a live Socratic dialogue through the online digital platform Mentimeter—or an immersive VR experience that will grab you and pull you into another world in real time.
And if you crave what humanists are traditionally known for—storytelling—you won’t want to miss Creative Writing students reading their work or Germanic Studies students giving lightning talks.
Not to mention the chance to be in the front row of one of the most boisterous, irreverent and utterly timeless kinds of live theatre – the medieval York play.
And as our afternoon panel of distinguished humanities alums showcases, with a degree in the humanities in your pocket, you can propel yourself toward anything you want to do in the world…
... from providing leadership in a global corporation to working at DC Comics.
This is not your grandmother’s humanities!
At Illinois, the story of the humanities is one of perpetual motion. Right here in C-U.
In 2025, study in the humanities invites you to keep moving as you bring your whole self to the table, no matter what you study or want to do after Illinois.
So come to Humanities Open House on Saturday October 4th to watch, listen, learn. Bring a friend, a neighbor, a high school student from this community or elsewhere in the state you might know.
Join us to experience how and why the humanities is the key which unlocks everything the universe has to offer, no matter what you study or who you want to be. View the full Open House schedule