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The Society of Architectural Historians has received a $199,596 American Rescue Plan grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities that will sustain and expand av¸£ÀûÉç’s public humanities programs and publications, and retain the staff members responsible for managing them. av¸£ÀûÉç is among nearly 300 cultural and educational institutions that were awarded ARP relief funding from NEH. 

“We at av¸£ÀûÉç are thrilled and grateful to NEH for this important funding. In recent years av¸£ÀûÉç has greatly expanded its open access online publications, such as av¸£ÀûÉç Archipedia, and its public-oriented virtual programs, such as av¸£ÀûÉç CONNECTS, to share new research on the history of the built environment with all who have an interest in it," said av¸£ÀûÉç Executive Director Pauline Saliga. "This funding will preserve the jobs of key av¸£ÀûÉç staff who manage those free publications and programs, and will help av¸£ÀûÉç recover from the economic impact of the pandemic.”  

The pandemic drastically reduced or eliminated sources of revenue that av¸£ÀûÉç depends on to maintain operations essential to its mission and pay staff salaries. These revenue sources include membership dues, library journal subscriptions, national and international field trips, and in-person annual conferences. 

The ARP relief grant will support the retention of four staff members who manage av¸£ÀûÉç’s free online public programs and publications and are crucial to sustaining its core humanities activities: av¸£ÀûÉç Director of Programs Christopher Kirbabas, av¸£ÀûÉç Director of Communications Helena Dean, av¸£ÀûÉç Director of av¸£ÀûÉç Anne Bird, and av¸£ÀûÉç Archipedia/BUS Managing Editor Catherine Boland Erkkila. Each of these individuals played a key role in creating and delivering publicly accessible online programs and publications during the pandemic and will continue to do so in the future. 

When the pandemic forced av¸£ÀûÉç to cancel all in-person events, it responded by moving its annual conference online and making conference roundtables and keynote talks open to the public for free. av¸£ÀûÉç ventured further into the virtual realm, creating a year-round series of free programming called av¸£ÀûÉç CONNECTS. Recordings of these issue-oriented discussions, publishing and teaching workshops, and roundtables are available to the public via av¸£ÀûÉç’s . av¸£ÀûÉç will continue to promote knowledge and discourse among scholars and advance public engagement with the humanities through its free virtual programs.

av¸£ÀûÉç also plans to add hundreds of new essays and site histories to av¸£ÀûÉç Archipedia, its open access encyclopedia of the built environment of the United States. This new digital content will document and interpret buildings and public spaces across the U.S. and will include new work on the histories of spaces inhabited by marginalized people. 

Read the NEH press release: