National Humanities Medals Awarded to Five Women With Ties to Academia

Recently, 19 individuals and two organizations were presented with the National Humanities Medal at a White House ceremony. The National Humanities Medal honors an individual or organization whose work has deepened the nation’s understanding of the human experience, broadened citizens’ engagement with history or literature, or helped preserve and expand Americans’ access to cultural resources.

“The National Humanities Medal recipients have enriched our world through writing that moves and inspires us; scholarship that enlarges our understanding of the past; and through their dedication to educating, informing, and giving voice to communities and histories often overlooked,” said National Endowment for the Humanities Chair Shelly C. Lowe. “I am proud to recognize these distinguished leaders for their outstanding contributions to our nation’s cultural life.”

Five of the recipients are women with significant ties to the academic world.

(L to R) Joy Harjo, Robin Wall Kimmerer, Ruth J. Simmons, Rosita Kaaháni Worl, and Pauline Yu

Joy Harjo served three terms as the twenty-third poet laureate of the United States from 2019 to 2022. Earlier, she held the John C. Hodges Chair of Excellence in the department of English at the University of Tennessee. Previously, she served as a professor of English and American Indian studies at the University of Illinois. She has also taught at Arizona State University, the University of Colorado, the University of Arizona, and the University of New Mexico. Professor Harjo is the author of more than 10 books including Weaving Sundown in a Scarlet Light: Fifty Poems for Fifty Years (W.W. Norton, 2022) as well as plays, children’s books, poetry, and memoirs. Professor Harjo holds a bachelor’s degree from the University of New Mexico and a master of fine arts degree from the Iowa Writers Workshop.

Robin Wall Kimmerer is a State University of New York Distinguished Teaching Professor of Environmental Biology at the SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry in Syracuse and the founder and director of its Center for Native Peoples and the Environment. She is the author of several books including The Serviceberry: Abundance and Reciprocity in the Natural World (Scribner, 2024) and Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants (Milkweed Editions, 2020). In 2022 she was named a MacArthur Fellow. Dr. Kimmerer holds a bachelor’s degree in botany from the SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry. She earned a master’s degree and a Ph.D. in botany from the University of Wisconsin.

Ruth J. Simmons stepped down as president of Prairie View A&M University in Texas in 2022. She served as the eighteenth president of Brown University, the Ivy League educational institution in Providence, Rhode Island, from 2001 to 2012. Before becoming president of Brown University, Dr. Simmons was president of Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts. Earlier, she was vice provost at Princeton University in New Jersey and provost at Spelman College in Atlanta. Dr. Simmons is a native of Houston and is a product of the city’s public school system. She is a graduate of Dillard University in New Orleans, where she majored in French and holds a Ph.D. in Romance languages and literatures from Harvard University.

Rosita Kaaháni Worl is president of the Sealaska Heritage Institute in Juneau, Alaska. She has taught anthropology at the Juneau and Anchorage campuses of the University of Alaska. She is the co-editor of Living Our Cultures, Sharing Our Heritage: The First Peoples of Alaska (Smithsonian Books, 2010). Worl is a graduate of Alaska Methodist University in Anchorage. She earned a master’s degree in anthropology from Harvard University.

Pauline Yu retired from the presidency of the American Council of Learned Societies in 2019. Before leading the American Council of Learned Societes, she was dean of humanities in the College of Letters and Science and professor of East Asian languages and cultures  at the University of California, Los Angeles. Earlier in her career, Dr. Yu was was chair of the department of East Asian languages and literatures at the University of California, Irvine. She taught at Columbia University from 1985 to 1989) and at the University of Minnesota from 1976 to 1985. She is the author or editor of several books including Ways with Words: Writing about Reading Texts From Early China (University of California Press, 2000. Dr. Yu is a graduate of Harvard University. She earned a master’s degree and a Ph.D. in comparative literature from Stanford University.