#  About 

 



       ![header-about.jpg](/sites/g/files/omnuum10471/files/styles/hwp_21_9__1920x825/public/hmui/files/header-about.jpg?itok=d9y9Bbg5) 

 

 



 

 



The Harvard Mellon Urban Initiative is a multi-year project funded by Harvard University and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to expand understanding about urban life, social and political structures, design, and history across diverse sites and scales. The Initiative aims in particular to link humanistic approaches to cities with spatial investigations of the built and natural environments.



 

 

 The primary goals of the project include

 



 ### The development of sustained research projects that incorporate new visual and digital methods in the study of urban environments

 

   ![a hand reaching to an iPad showing a photograph of New York](/sites/g/files/omnuum10471/files/styles/hwp_16_9__480x270/public/hmui/files/visual-digital.jpg?itok=ukx85iLj) 

 

 

 

 ### Contributing to the Harvard curriculum with urban studies courses co-taught by the faculty of the Graduate School of Design and Faculty of Arts and Sciences 

 

   ![Harvard Graduate School of Design](/sites/g/files/omnuum10471/files/styles/hwp_16_9__480x270/public/hmui/files/gsd.png?itok=utN2EwNX) 

 

 

 

 ### Curating and co-organizing a comprehensive series of public programs

 

   ![group working in a public garden](/sites/g/files/omnuum10471/files/styles/hwp_16_9__480x270/public/hmui/files/public-programs.jpg?itok=EXVWjdOM) 

 

 

 

 ### Producing publications and exhibitions

 

   ![Institute of Contemporary Art Boston](/sites/g/files/omnuum10471/files/styles/hwp_16_9__480x270/public/hmui/files/exhibitions.jpg?itok=SYnQrFP4) 

 

 

 

 ### Nurturing intellectual community-building across disciplines

 

   ![group of scholars around a table](/sites/g/files/omnuum10471/files/styles/hwp_16_9__480x270/public/hmui/files/intelectual.jpg?itok=vSU4wYH4) 

 

 

 

  

 

 

 

 

   

**The initiative will play a significant role in shaping long-term goals for urban studies at Harvard’s undergraduate and graduate levels.**

 

 

 



 

 

 

 

Programs sponsored include urban-related research by faculty and students, public events, exhibitions, course activities, community engagement, and workshops. Housed in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences and the Graduate School of Design, the project engages scholars and students from throughout Harvard and the Boston area. The Initiative intends to pave the way to an interdisciplinary secondary field in urban studies for Harvard students at both the undergraduate and graduate levels.



 

 

##  Our People 

We bring together scholars and resources to establish a vigorous, interdisciplinary and coordinated study of urban environments in the humanities.



 

 



 [ Meet our people arrow\_circle\_right ](/hmui-people)