Institute for Freedoms, Inc.
You Are Now Entering a Democracy Reimagined
National Arts and Humanities Month
Welcome to a Multivocal America
DateOctober 2023
In 2018, the artist collective For Freedoms commissioned billboards in all 50 states to encourage voting. The pictured billboard, installed in New Orleans, reconceives illustrator and painter Normal Rockwell’s Four Freedoms series by depicting a more inclusive American electorate. Photo: courtesy For Freedoms
This National Arts and Humanities Month, we’re exploring how a more expanded sense of “We the People” might alter the course of democracy for the better.
As we enter another season of civic engagement, it’s hard not to bristle at what has become a sustained period of political upheaval. Our divisions feel sharp, and our differences seem irreconcilable. It’s tempting to retreat from public life.
But if you look and listen carefully—in your local park or library, your favorite museum, or your place of worship—you may discover that the American Story is more complicated than the narratives we’re used to hearing. The more voices we invite into the conversation, the more interesting our national story becomes. Civic engagement then takes on new meaning, and new possibilities.
This is, after all, a multivocal America. What does that mean to you?
Past event
Civic Engagement and the Determined Hope of the Humanities
Claudia Peña
Executive Director, For Freedoms
Executive Director, For Freedoms
“Sometimes we argue. But that’s an important part of the work, right? We insist on that collaborative approach, and I think that’s why we make pretty awesome things.”
National Arts and Humanities Month
It’s a Multivocal America. What Does That Mean to You?
Robert W. Woodruff Library of the Atlanta University Center, Inc.
Archiving Student Activism Means More than You Think
October 26, 2022
Op-Ed: My family taught me ‘the act of voting is democracy made manifest’
Civic Nation
A Nonpartisan Initiative Empowers College Students to Go ALL IN as Voters and Engaged Citizens
Explore how our grantees honor our multivocal national identity
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