Melbourne Public Humanities Initiative

Embrace your Humanity

Let's spark imagination, start conversations, find meaning, create empathy, and rekindle hope. It’s time to re-connect, to interrogate ideas and have the hard conversations. It’s time to bring together knowledge from different schools of thought.

An antidote to uncertain and disconnected times, the Melbourne Public Humanities Initiative (MPHI) is re-imagining the public square.

Learn more about MPHI

Billboard Poetry

We invited budding and established poets from across our community to submit a haiku for our 2nd annual Billboard Poetry competition.
The Wondering Poet

A dynamic poetry workshop available to visit high schools in Victoria.
The Readings Big Book Club

The inaugural five-part Big Book Club series will explore Homer's The Odyssey with weekly sessions guided by our leading academics from June 18 to July 16.
Great Books bite size

Explore 'Great Books' that have shaped the way we see the world.

Hear your Humanity

Take a moment to tune in and slow down, wherever you are.

Absolutely Revolting

Travel back through time with Dr Liam Byrne and Francis Leach, as they meet the ratbags and revolutionaries of the past, who shaped the present.
Unfolded

Hear short stories from some of Australia’s favourite writers, then join Seth Robinson and Professor Tony Birch as they go inside each story with the author.
MissPerceived

Join Professor Leah Ruppanner as she breaks down all the gender myths that shape our lives at home and work.

See your Humanity

Hear from our New Humanity Makers as they define what the humanities mean to them.

Tracie D Hall: on information and imagination

For librarian, scholar and activist, Tracie D Hall, getting people back into libraries—and reminding us of the value they offer society—has become a lifelong mission.
Sarah Churchwell: on translation

For a long time, public discourse on ‘the humanities’ have placed them in opposition to the STEM disciplines.
Tony Birch: on storytelling

I wasn't well or formally educated, but I was always an avid reader. I think of literature as one of the main branches of the humanities. It's the way that I came to understand the world, understand my place in it.