First National Picture of Trends in the Humanities Is Unveiled

By JENNIFER HOWARD

When it comes to hard data about what they do, policy makers and educators in the humanities have been mostly left out in the cold, forced to rely on isolated statistics that do not give an overview of the field. That changed this month, as the American Academy of Arts and Sciences unveiled the prototype of its long-awaited Humanities Indicators project.

Patterned after the Science and Engineering Indicators generated every two years by the National Science Board, the Humanities