Louisa Shepard

The 24 adults seated in the class, from at least a dozen countries, are each connected to someone at Penn. They are here to learn to speak English, free of charge.

Studying a map on his iPad, Owen Smith looks up at the street signs and back down at the map. He looks both ways, then turns right down 34th Street, the correct direction for his destination, the Penn Museum.The decision prompts praise from the group of students crowded around him on the street corner.

The room is packed. The 24 adults seated in the class, from at least a dozen countries, are each connected to someone at the University of Pennsylvania. They are here to learn to speak English, free of charge.

Clues to creating new antibiotics may be hidden in a 15th-century medical text, now being studied by a medievalist at Penn.

The cadence of her poem is almost lyrical as Fatemeh Shams, speaking in her native Persian, reads aloud to the audience at Kelly Writers House. But the tone is forceful as she nearly spits out the word repeated in each phrase: تبعيد, "exile."  

Little black footprints track across the map drawn on worn fig-bark paper, marking the land boundaries in an ancient Mexican village.

What started with a Penn Libraries program to ensure a West Philadelphia elementary school library would remain open has turned into a sustainable model for service learning.

What the Oscar winners say may be of more interest than what they wear at this year’s much-anticipated Academy Awards ceremony, says Peter Decherney, a professor of cinema and media studies in the Department of English and the

A handout Brad Duncan picked up during the 1995 Detroit newspaper strike is a first in his unique and extensive collection of printed materials, now more than 15,000 pieces. 

The sounds emanating from the headphones that hang under each photograph combine to create a constant accompaniment, setting the tone for the unique “Landscape/Soundscape” exhibit on display at the Arthur Ross Gallery.