Rhodes College will expand its long-established Search program with the support of a $75,000 grant from The Teagle Foundation. “Revising and Renewing the Search Program at Rhodes College” is the title of the proposal for the grant, which will be used for three academic years through June 30, 2027. This grant follows a $25,000 planning grant the college received in 2023, jointly sponsored by The Teagle Foundation and the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Established in 1945, the curriculum originally was called Man in the Light of History and Religion; in 1986, it became The Search for Values in the Light of Western History and Religion. Search today is a three-semester interdisciplinary curriculum focused on ideas, beliefs, technologies, and cultural developments that emerged from societies around the Mediterranean, in the Near East, Europe, and Africa and that have contributed to the formation of modern America. Students read and discuss selections from the works of philosophers, theologians, political theorists, scientists, and artists. Texts include the Epic of Gilgamesh, the Homeric Iliad and Odyssey, the Hebrew Bible, the New Testament, Virgil’s Aeneid, Augustine’s Confessions, the Qur’an, and Dante’s Divine Comedy.
“This award recognizes the work of the Search team over the last few years, which has focused on developing a library of contemporary works that engage with ancient and medieval readings, designing a minor in humanities, and working on a series of regional travel-study experiences for students in the Search sequence, and will provide us with the resources to expand the role of former students in the evolution of the program and the promotion of the humanities more broadly on campus,” said Dr. Kenny Morrell, associate professor of Ancient Mediterranean Studies and co-chair of Search.
The $75,000 grant will be used toward the following three areas: faculty development, building a sense of community, and curricular innovation, including placing diverse contemporary voices and perspectives in conversation with historical texts and developing an interdisciplinary humanities minor.
“For decades, the Search program at Rhodes has changed students’ lives by allowing them to explore the big questions of human existence through a close reading of transformative texts,” said Dr. Timothy S. Huebner, provost and vice president for academic affairs. “We are thrilled that The Teagle Foundation supports our ongoing efforts to revise and expand this signature interdisciplinary humanities program.”