College of Liberal Arts - Humanities, Health and Medicine

The field of Humanities, Health, and Medicine, which can also be referred to as the Medical or Health Humanities, explores and advances relationships between the humanities, arts, and social sciences on the one hand and health and health care on the other. The content and methods of humanistic disciplines have the power to transform health care for all by enhancing human connections, deepening the capacity for empathy, and improving our understanding of the cultural and social contexts in which health, illness, and care occur. At the same time, focusing on health and health care reveals new relevance for humanistic scholarship and teaching in a society increasingly dominated by STEM fields.

Gifts will be used both to support our incoming cohort of masters students and to fund health humanities lectures and readings open to the public.

Donor generosity has enabled us to stage such events as a panel discussion on "Liberal Arts and Medical Practice," which featured three practicing physicians who had majored in a humanities discipline while in college. Such events serve our own students but also the larger campus and Austin communities. Donor gifts have also supported networking and team-building events aimed specifically at our masters students.