Description
Established in 1804 as New York’s first museum, the New–York Historical Society (N–YHS) seeks to increase worldwide understanding of American history and art through exhibitions, public programs, online outreach, and research that reveal the dynamism of history and its influence on the world today. Its collection includes over 14 million documents, works of art, artifacts, and ephemera that cover four centuries of American history. In 2015, N–YHS dramatically enhanced its holdings with the acquisition of the complete institutional archives of Time, Inc., and in 2017 it reopened the newly designed Henry Luce III Center for the Study of American Culture. N–YHS’s primary activities include multidisciplinary exhibitions, educational programming, public tours and events, collections–related publications, a traveling exhibition program, and research and scholarship opportunities, including an active fellowship program.
From September 2022 to February 2023, N–YHS will present “Religion and the American West,” an expansive public history project comprising a major historical traveling exhibition, accompanying educational initiatives, and a scholarly fellowship program. The project will explore the ways in which diverse American religiosities and spiritual traditions helped shape westward expansion and the exercise of religion in the United States from the 1820s to the 1920s, giving rise to profound social, political, and cultural change. Grounded in rigorous scholarship at the forefront of its field, this interdisciplinary effort occupies the intersection of religious studies, migration studies, and American history, examining the important ways in which religion animated and was in turn shaped by westward expansion. N–YHS will be the first secular institution in recent years to present a large–scale exhibition on the role of religion in westward expansion, and one of the only museums on the East Coast to carry out a major in–depth exhibition on the history of the American West.
Exploring religion as a source of identity and belief, a force of social organization and control, and a driver and marker of settlement, the project will focus on the wide variety of groups who are part of this history: Native peoples; Protestant missionaries and social reformers from the Northeast; Mormon settlers in Utah and its surrounding areas; Western Catholic communities; African American “Exodusters”; and smaller population groups such as Jewish traders and Chinese immigrant workers. The project will highlight specific encounters among these groups, illuminating the ways in which their respective patterns of conflict, coexistence, and synergy shaped the past and present of the American West, and providing nuanced historical context for contemporary discussions around religious freedom, plurality, and American governance.
New–York Historical Society is seeking Luce Foundation support for several key aspects of this project, including: consultations with academic and community experts to inform the exhibition and accompanying initiatives; the establishment of an early career fellows program that will advance research in the fields of American history and religious studies, and result in written and audio–visual publications that disseminate the work to new audiences; public programs and expert–led tours at N–YHS that engage local audiences; the production of an exhibit catalog; and the creation of an exhibit discussion kit designed to help national faith, civic, and educational organizations host community conversations that probe deeply into the history and topics conveyed in the exhibit.
Providing partial support for the production of the exhibition catalog and exhibition discussion guide, the Luce Foundation’s grant would also fund project research, community consultations, and a series of public programs. In addition, the grant will provide support for a project director, fund honoraria for members of an academic advisory group, and support consultations with a wider network of scholars. Finally, the grant will provide stipends for early career scholars selected to participate in the fellowship program, support for faculty leadership of that program, and funding both for the convening of fellows and for the production of digital media projects created by fellows, including blogs, podcasts, and videos.
Recommendation: That the Directors of the Henry Luce Foundation approve a three–year grant of $300,000 to the New–York Historical Society to support “Religion and the American West.”
