Modern Language Association

05/29/2026

We need humanities scholars to support thoughtful participation in democracy. To that end, the MLA Style Center has published the MLA Democracy Project, a collection of essays that addresses the interpretative skills required of participants in a democracy. Learn more: https://style.mla.org/the-mla-democracy-project/

05/28/2026

"The most striking difference between this list and its predecessors is an increase in female writers: 36 out of 100 compared with 21 in 2015 and a paltry 16 in 2003, with only Jane Austen’s Emma and Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein in the top 10 of both previous lists. The number of women rises as the decades go by; half of the contemporary writers are female."

Jane Eyre or Wuthering Heights. Ulysses or Catch-22 … Find out which title came top, as chosen by authors, critics and academics worldwide

05/27/2026

Join us on 30 June (2:00 p.m. ET) for a free webinar, AI and the Humanities: A Framework for Language and Literary Scholarship. The webinar will introduce the framework developed by the MLA's AI and Research Working Group to support informed, principled engagement with emerging AI technologies. After introducing the framework, working group members will lead a hands-on activity that allows participants to work through scenarios from the working paper. Attendees will leave with a shared vocabulary for articulating concerns, a working set of disclosure conventions to test in their own publications, and a method for ongoing dialogue as both the technology and our understanding of it continue to evolve. Learn more and register:

The MLA offers professional development programming throughout the year to support members and those working in languages, literatures, and the humanities. Additional free virtual programming can be found on our Webinars and Conversations...

05/26/2026

"This is the deeper distinction: translation is not the same as participation. Learning a language involves understanding how people think, their values, and how meaning is shaped by context and history. This cultural literacy develops through interaction and experience. We can’t fully outsource that to systems that translate on demand."

There’s a difference between using a tool to assist you, and using one to replace cognitive effort.

05/25/2026

"A.I. has made it easier to quickly create audiobooks using synthetic narration. Because most antipiracy technology is designed to catch identical files, not altered ones, many of them avoid detection by programs used to identify copyright infringement. A.I. versions of highly anticipated titles often appear on YouTube hours after they are released."

Illegal, synthetically narrated copies of “The Hunger Games,” hit self-help books and everything in between are increasingly common on the platform.

05/24/2026

"Tik-Tok first appeared in 1907 in Baum’s third Oz book, Ozma of Oz, described as a 'mechanical man.' This was more than a decade before Czech playwright Karel Čapek introduced the word 'robot' in Rossum’s Universal Robots."

Long before chatbots, fiction grappled with rule-bound intelligence, exploring what it means to build and rely on thinking machines.

05/23/2026

"When J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings books appeared in the mid-1950s, they were met with very mixed reviews, an unsurprising reception given that nothing like them had been written for adult readers since Edmund Spenser’s epic 16th century English poem The Faerie Queene, perhaps.”

When J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings books appeared in the mid-1950s, they were met with very mixed reviews, an unsurprising reception given that nothing like them had been written for adult readers since Edmund Spenser’s epic 16th century English poem The Faerie Queene, perhaps.

05/22/2026

Humanities research is invaluable to our ability to understand the ethical implications of AI and other emerging technologies. Make your case for why we need humanities research using this tool kit from ACLS: acls.org/TalkAboutHumanities/
For AI guidance from the MLA, be sure to check out our AI Resources page on the MLA Style Center: https://style.mla.org/ai-resources/
2d

05/21/2026

"Having been abandoned at the very earliest stage of the book’s creation, the drawings offer a rare glimpse into Shepard’s working process and imagination as he brought AA Milne’s character to life."

E H Shepard drawings go on display for book’s centenary, showing how he brought AA Milne’s character to life

05/20/2026

The MLA invites graduate student members to apply for Edward Guiliano Global Fellowships. These fellowships of up to $2,500 support research and learning opportunities beyond students’ immediate community, including research toward publication, dissertation completion, or transformative experiential learning. Learn more and apply by 9 July. https://www.mla.org/Resources/Career/MLA-Grants-and-Awards/Edward-Guiliano-Global-Fellowships

05/19/2026

In a 7 May decision, US District Judge Colleen McMahon ruled that mass termination by the National Endowment for the Humanities of more than 1,400 grants to support scholars, research institutions, and humanities organizations was “unlawful, unconstitutional, ultra vires, and without legal effect.” Read the full decision at www.mla.org/NEH-lawsuit.