Imagining America

IA's MAY 2026 NEWSLETTER IS NOW LIVE!
This month’s newsletter features:
• the 2026 IA National Gathering CFP,
• the PAGE and IA/JGS Fellowship CFPs,
• a member spotlight on Penn State University,
• an excerpt from the Public Scholar Imagination Guide toolkit, and
• a selection of resources including regional events, news from the field, open calls, and recommendations from our network!

You can read this month's edition at: Email link https://conta.cc/4nIIQWZ

PLEASE NOTE: IA is engaging in a deep learning process about the harms created by corporate social media and is exploring transitioning off selected platforms by end of this year. We will be reducing the number of posts on selected platforms as we prepare for this transition. We advise our community to sign up for our newsletter (https://conta.cc/4vHEQcZ), and to follow us on LinkedIn, for continued access to news from the IA network.

The CALL FOR PARTICIPATION to the 2026 IA National Gathering - Tides of Transition: Restoring Collective Spirit in Troubled Times - is now open! Organized in partnership with the University of California, Davis and a diverse regional Steering Committee, Imagining America: Artists and Scholars in Public Life (IA) invites participants to gather in Davis, California, October 23-25.

Reflecting on the importance of transitions – from political crises to global climate change, and personal identity to organizational transformation – this call for participation invites proposals that share stories, research, creative works, and community practices exploring the complex process of transitioning away from systems of fear and domination and towards restoring collective spirit. (Art by Angelica Sauceda, TANA Archive)

Learn more at: https://conta.cc/4uK9n8L

PLEASE NOTE: IA is engaging in a deep learning process about the harms created by corporate social media and is exploring transitioning off selected platforms in the next 6 months. We will be reducing the number of posts on selected platforms as we prepare for this transition. We advise our community to sign up for our newsletter (https://conta.cc/4vHEQcZ), and to follow us on LinkedIn, for continued access to news from the IA network.

Join us for a DIGITAL DIVESTMENT ROUND TABLE on May 14, 11am PST.

This round table begins a conversation around why we may (or may not) want to migrate away from Big Tech platforms, so that we may imagine and enact a retreat from unethical, oppressive incarnations of these tools toward community-oriented platforms. We invite you to come with your own questions, suggestions for actions, tools, and resources, so that we may establish a community of practice to collectively transition to technologies and platforms that hold privacy, security, and community connection at their core. Register here: https://conta.cc/3QrMA2J

PLEASE NOTE: IA is engaging in a deep learning process about the harms created by corporate social and is exploring transitioning off selected platforms in the next 6 months. We will be reducing the number of posts on selected platforms as we prepare for this transition. We advise our community to sign up for our newsletter (https://conta.cc/4ezoX2d), and to follow us on LinkedIn, for continued access to news from the IA network.

IA's APRIL 2026 NEWSLETTER IS NOW LIVE!
This month’s newsletter features:
• an announcement about the 2026 IA Collaboratories cohort,
• a guide on how to create an Agreement for a Just Partnership with Indigenous culture-bearers,
• registration links for upcoming IA events (Meet IA, Digital Divestment Roundtable), and
• a selection of resources including regional events, news from the field, open calls, and recommendations from our network!

You can read this month's edition at: https://conta.cc/48lhFeC

PLEASE NOTE: IA is engaging in a deep learning process about the harms created by corporate social media and is exploring transitioning off selected platforms in the next 6 months. We will be reducing the number of posts on selected platforms as we prepare for this transition. To learn more, join us for the Digital Divestment Roundtable (May 14, 11am, on zoom). Register here: https://conta.cc/3QrMA2J

We advise our community to sign up for our newsletter (https://conta.cc/4vHEQcZ), and to follow us on LinkedIn, for continued access to news from the IA network.

JOIN US TOMORROW
Wednesday March 25, 12 NOON PT / 1PM MT / 2PM CT / 3PM ET
On Zoom
for the second in a series of events

This episode of the IA Collaboratory project ‘Tools for the Undercommons Speaker Series,’ features Romi Ron Morrison (interdisciplinary artist, researcher, and educator at UCLA Design Media Arts), and Sarah Biscarra Dilley (a multidisciplinary artist, writer, educator, member of the yak titʸu titʸu yak tiłhini Northern Chumash tribe and Director of Indigenous Programs and Relationality at Forge Project).

This IA Collaboratory is organized by professors Jacqueline Jean Barrios and Harris Kornstein (Public & Applied Humanities, University of Arizona), and each virtual event features two guest speakers in a salon-style conversation with attendees.

Register for the event at: https://conta.cc/40ol87R

IA's MARCH 2026 NEWSLETTER IS NOW ONLINE!

This month's newsletter includes:
• a spotlight on University of Arizona and the Tools for the Undercommons Speaker Series,
• a guide on how to organize your own storycircle,
• the latest episode from the re-launch of IA StoryShare, and
• a selection of resources including regional events, news from the field, open calls, and recommendations from our network!

You can read this month's edition at: https://conta.cc/4uFGafW

JOIN US
Wednesday March 25, 12 NOON PT / 1PM MT / 2PM CT / 3PM ET
On Zoom
for the second in a series of events

This episode of the IA Collaboratory project ‘Tools for the Undercommons Speaker Series,’ features Romi Ron Morrison (interdisciplinary artist, researcher, and educator at UCLA Design Media Arts), and Sarah Biscarra Dilley (a multidisciplinary artist, writer, educator, member of the yak titʸu titʸu yak tiłhini Northern Chumash tribe and Director of Indigenous Programs and Relationality at Forge Project).

This IA Collaboratory is organized by professors Jacqueline Jean Barrios and Harris Kornstein (Public & Applied Humanities, University of Arizona), and each virtual event features two guest speakers in a salon-style conversation with attendees.

Register for the event at: https://conta.cc/40ol87R

This month's MEMBER SPOTLIGHT on University of Richmond, doubles as the second episode of IA STORYSHARE, a podcast series that features one-on-one conversations between publicly engaged community members who join together in critical dialogue and share lessons learned from the field.

For this season of IA Storyshare, we brought together participants from the most recent 2025 IA National Gathering at Las Cruces, NM. In this second episode, longtime collaborators Chaz Barracks and Sylvia Gale talk about black joy and play, creative administration, and surviving the academy.

Checkout the IA StoryShare on Podbean, iTunes, Spotify and other major platforms: https://iastoryshare.podbean.com/

THE CALL FOR 2026 IA REGIONAL COLLABORATORIES IS NOW OPEN!

As we approach the planned transition of Imagining America to a new host campus in 2027, we are interested in supporting IA member campuses examining how practices of imagination are critical to organizing personal, institutional, and societal transformation.

Through regional activities that allow for creative exploration, convenings that provide space for co-creation, and ways of being together that center curiosity and care, IA invites member campuses to make and share the worlds we need and want. Submit your application by the March 13 deadline!

Apply here: https://conta.cc/4rMJbcx

IA's FEBRUARY 2026 NEWSLETTER IS NOW ONLINE!

This month's newsletter includes:
• call for proposals for 2026 IA Collaboratories,
• the latest episode from the re-launch of IA StoryShare which shines a spotlight on University of Richmond,
• instructions and registration for the 2026 Mail Art Project, and
• a selection of resources including regional events, news from the field, open calls, and recommendations from our network!

You can read this month's edition at: https://conta.cc/4cU4R1E