Skip to main
University-wide Navigation
origins

Our Year on Origins

Coinciding with the United States’ quarter millennial, the Gaines theme for 2025-2026 explores the meaning of origins through the prism of disciplinary viewpoints offered by the humanities, the arts, and the sciences. The Gaines Fellows seminar highlights the multiplicity of beginnings not only for Lexington and the United States but also for current technologies, social institutions, political movements, the planet, humans, and other species as the city and nation commemorate—and reckon with—our 250th anniversaries 

Gaines Newsletter: Spring 2025

News and Upcoming Events

REGISTRATION OPENS IN NOVEMBER HMN 303 Humanities in Action

Join Architecture faculty Darren Taylor and Special Collections Preservationist Ruth Bryan for this special team-taught course in the applied humanities. The course will feature the Raymond Betts House as a case-study to explore how our community works to renovate, protect, and preserve our historic buildings. Registration opens in November--check MyUK for your registration window. 

NOW ACCEPTING NOMINATIONS The 2026 Gaines Lecture for Outstanding Research in the Humanities

The Gaines Center for the Humanities is now accepting nominations and self-nominations for the second annual Lecture for Outstanding Research in the Humanities. This opportunity recognizes advances in the humanities by early career scholars at the University of Kentucky, spotlighting groundbreaking work related to Gaines Center’s annual theme. The 2025-26 theme is “Origins.” 

APPLICATIONS NOW OPEN The 2026 Bingham Seminar HMN 300 Sustainable Futures Design Lab: Appalachia x France

The Gaines Center for the Humanities is excited to announce HMN 300: Sustainable Futures Design Lab, an extraordinary opportunity for students to combine academic inquiry with hands-on, real-world engagement in Spring 2026.

The Gaines 40th Alumni Reunion

The Gaines' 40th anniversary alumni reunion will take place October 23-25, 2025. Visit our reunion page for more information. 

the 2025 bale boone symposium Ebony G. Patterson

The UK Gaines Center is thrilled to welcome former UK faculty and MacArthur Grant awardee,