School of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences

MIT Professor Evan Lieberman, the Total Chair on Contemporary Africa, has created the Department of Political Science's first online course through MITx.

Political science debuts on MITx

New online course takes a deep dive into democracy in Africa.

August 25, 2017

MIT students, students from the University of Venice, and faculty members from both institutions pose in front of Venice's experimental floodgates as part of a collaborative summer workshop.

Saving Venice, MIT-style

MISTI interns and MIT faculty tackle rising sea level challenges at Italian research camp this summer.

August 23, 2017

Tuesday night, at the inaugural Play Labs demo event, 13 startups presented products they’ve developed in the accelerator. Afterward, the crowd was treated to live demonstrations of the technologies.

Demo day showcases serious innovation in “playful” tech

Play Labs startups include virtual pets, nausea-reducing virtual reality games, and augmented-reality paintballing.

August 17, 2017

Members of the Buyukozturk group pose on the skydeck of the Engineering Building of Bogazici University, in Istanbul. Left to right: Murat Uzun, Justin Chen, MIT Professor Oral Buyukozturk, Hao Sun, and Steven Palkovic. The group traveled to Turkey to present their research as part of a collaborative workshop.

Using energy-based designs to enhance earthquake hazard resistance

International workshop funded by new MISTI Global Seed Fund showcases the potential of energy-based structural analysis and sensing.

August 10, 2017

Investigating the dynamics of war and peace

Erik Sand brings a perspective shaped by eight years of service in the U.S. Navy to his doctoral studies.

August 7, 2017

Senreve's signature handbags are sold online only, allowing the company to offer a wider array of colors than brick-and-mortar competitors.

How to court millennial shoppers? Lose the logo

Alumna Wendy Wen '09 co-founded an online handbag company to create a new generation of luxury for savvy younger shoppers.

August 1, 2017

Twenty high school girls from around the country participated in this year’s Women’s Technology Program (WTP), a four-week program that gives girls hands-on engineering experience in the lab and classroom. Pictured here, this summer’s WTP class takes a tour of the Pappalardo Lab.

Closing the gender gap in mechanical engineering

Women make up 49.5 percent of MIT’s undergraduates in mechanical engineering, due to department’s proactive approach, study finds.

July 31, 2017

Left to right: LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman and Media Lab Director Joi Ito joined Disobedience Award finalists Phyllis Young and LaDonna Brave Bull Allard; Betina Kaplan and Lorgia García-Peña; and James Hansen; along with winners Marc Edwards and Mona Hanna-Attisha.

Defiance: Disobedience for the good of all

MIT Media Lab summer event explores responsible dissent, embodied in its new Disobedience Award.

July 25, 2017

Tracy Robyn Slatyer, the Jerrold R. Zacharias CD Assistant Professor in the Department of Physics, receives her award from Dennis Freeman, dean for undergraduate education.

Second annual MIT Teaching with Digital Technology Awards recipients selected

Faculty and instructors recognized for improving classroom instruction and student engagement through innovative uses of digital technology.

July 25, 2017

“You could think of the cricket pitch as a microcosm of caste issues in India,” says Matt Lowe (bottom, second from right), a PhD candidate leading a study in India to see if the popular game of cricket can help bridge caste divides.

When castes collide

PhD student Matt Lowe uses cricket tournaments to explore caste interactions in rural India and whether the popular sport can help bridge class divides.

July 20, 2017

Longtime MIT professor of humanities A.R. "Pete" Gurney

A.R. Gurney, acclaimed playwright, author, and longtime MIT professor, dies at 86

An MIT humanities and literature faculty member for 36 years, Gurney was known as an outstanding teacher and inspiring mentor.

July 12, 2017

“We find that patients who go to hospitals that rely more on skilled nursing facilities after discharge, as opposed to getting them healthy enough to return home, are substantially less likely to survive over the following year,” says Professor Joseph Doyle.

Hospitals that spend more on emergency care yield better outcomes

Study: Investing more in inpatient care relative to longer-term nursing facilities reduces mortality rates.

July 9, 2017

“This is not the first time that we have seen anti-immigrant sentiments surge in the U.S.,” said MIT Assistant Professor Justin Steil at a recent MIT Starr Forum, The Fight Over Foreigners: Visas and Immigration in the Trump Era. “Despite the fact that most U.S. residents are descended from either voluntary or involuntary migrants, all the way back to Benjamin Franklin there has been skeptic...

3 Questions: Justin Steil on the Trump administration travel ban

Assistant professor of urban studies and planning argues immigration is good for the U.S. and that President Trump's executive order threatens national security.

July 7, 2017

By comparing 1.6 million pairs of photos taken seven years apart, researchers have now used a new computer vision system to quantify the physical improvement or deterioration of neighborhoods in five American cities, in an attempt to identify factors that predict urban change. Pictured are two street views, with the old photograph on the left and the new photograph on the right.

Why do some neighborhoods improve?

Density of highly educated residents, rather than income or housing costs, predicts revitalization.

July 6, 2017

A new study engaged preschool children in math games intended to help them grasp concepts of number and geometry, and in social games intended to help them cooperate and learn together.

Study: Preschoolers learn from math games — to a point

Games found to improve conceptual math skills, but gains may not carry over to primary school.