University Awarded $2.6 Million Grant for “A Counter-Imaginary in Authoritarian Times”

Some exciting news from the university’s Center for Interdisciplinary Critical Inquiry (CICI) this month, as CICI and the International Consortium of Critical Theory Programs (ICCTP) have been awarded $2.6 million to support a multi-year initiative titled “A Counter-Imaginary in Authoritarian Times.”

Through collaborative workshops, conferences, performances, publications, and a dynamic, open-ended digital platform, this project brings together academics, artists, activists, and other community members. The project is funded by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and is led by scholars Judith Butler, Distinguished Professor in the Graduate School; Shannon Jackson, Cyrus and Michelle Hadidi Professor; Debarati Sanyal, Zaffaroni Family Chair; and Denise Ferreira da Silva, Samuel Rudin Professor in the Humanities, New York University. 

The initiative confronts censorship and surveillance targeting academic and artistic freedom, particularly in relation to fields and policies focusing on gender, race, ethnic studies, migration, diversity, and sexuality. Sanyal emphasized the importance of the arts in the project, “Our commitment is to facilitate a passionate counter-imaginary, one that affirms the desire for freedom, the commitment to equality, the aspiration for justice. What might that look like, sound like, feel like?”

At UC Berkeley, new programs led by faculty in the Division of Arts & Humanities will engage students, artists, and the local community. Professor Jackson will lead a series of courses and free public lectures on “Authority and the Arts,” exploring how various public art projects address contemporary manifestations of authority around issues of climate policy, reproductive rights, immigration, human rights, public infrastructure, and democratic process. More UC Berkeley faculty, staff, curators, and affiliated artists will develop public programs and artistic projects throughout the three-year grant.