Prison Education Program Receives Missouri Humanities Council Grant

07/12/2018

The Missouri Humanities Council (MHC) has awarded a grant of $9,600 to the Saint Louis University Prison Education Program in support of the project, “Representations of Incarceration Through the Arts.”

The MHC is the only state-wide agency in Missouri devoted exclusively to humanities education for citizens of all ages. It has served as a state affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities since 1971.

The Saint Louis University Prison Education Program is a Jesuit-inspired initiative that provides access to liberal arts educational opportunities for incarcerated people and prison staff in the greater St. Louis region. It has offered for-credit and noncredit higher education and arts programming in the region since 2008.

Speakers and discussions in the 2018-19 Inside Out Speaker Series will explore the theme of “prison in the arts,” providing a space for incarcerated people and invited speakers to engage in dialogue about how prison and people incarcerated are represented in public through an examination of the arts. Through discussions of music history, film, drama, literature, and new media, speakers and participants will explore the diverse ways in which prison life has been a source and subject for compelling art.

These events will take place at the Eastern Reception, Diagnostic and Correctional Center (ERDCC) in Bonne Terre, Mo.

For more information about the grants program of the Missouri Humanities Council, call 314-781-9660 or 800-357-0909, or write to the MHC, 415 S. 18th Street, Suite. 100, St. Louis, MO 63103.

For more information about the SLU Prison Education Program, please contact program manager Julie O’Heir at julie.oheir@slu.edu.