English

‘What can be done today?’

Senior Aminata Sy founded a program for Philly kids and will soon head to Congress to begin her Rangel Graduate Fellowship.

Susan Ahlborn

A life of writing and song

Rosanne Cash, a Kelly Writers House Fellow, was on campus for a course taught by English Professor Al Filreis that focuses on three eminent writers each spring semester.  

Louisa Shepard

The times and life of W.E.B. Du Bois at Penn

In 1896, Du Bois was appointed an assistant instructor at Penn and began his investigation of the Seventh Ward of Philadelphia—research that he would turn into his groundbreaking work, “The Philadelphia Negro.”

Greg Johnson

Walt Whitman up close

As part of the Penn Manuscript Collective, students transcribe rare documents and original works by Walt Whitman in the University’s collection. Their discoveries will be included in an international symposium at Penn this spring, Whitman at 200, led by the Penn Libraries marking the anniversary of the poet’s birth.

Louisa Shepard



Media Contact


In the News


Chronicle of Higher Education

The best scholarly books of 2023

Jed Esty of the School of Arts & Sciences is lauded for his 2022 book, “The Future of Decline,” which compares the current decline of U.S. power to the dissolution of the British empire.

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BBC

The Iliad: How modern readers get this epic wrong

In a Q&A, Emily Wilson of the School of Arts & Sciences discusses what the Iliad can tell us about modern society, from masculinity to environmentalism.

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The Washington Post

To his final days, my father always knew how to pull off the landing

In an Op-Ed, Paul Hendrickson of the School of Arts & Sciences reflects on his father’s legacy as a pilot and their complex relationship.

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Philadelphia Magazine

Why are 30,000 people studying poetry online with this guy?

Al Filreis of the School of Arts & Sciences is spotlighted for his popular online course on modern poetry.

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Financial Times

American mockery of Britain masks a deeper insecurity

Jed Esty of the School of Arts & Sciences says that Americans use Britain as a metaphor, a cultural projection of American anxiety.

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ABC Australia

The new Bridgerton prequel is ‘fiction inspired by fact’. So who was the real Queen Charlotte?

Ania Loomba of the School of Arts & Sciences says that a person historically described as a Moor or “blackamoor” wasn’t necessarily Black.

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