The leadership role of The Dallas Institute of Humanities and Culture is changing. Longtime Executive Director Larry Allums is retiring after 23 years. Taking over the helm of the 40-year-old nonprofit educational organization will be Dr. Seemee Ali, who will be its “first-ever president.”
In accepting this new role, Seemee told the Institute’s Board of Directors and membership, “At a time when our culture is in crisis, when civil discourse is increasingly difficult, and the unresolved pandemic exposes ever new fault lines in our communities, the humane work of the Dallas Institute is vital. We need the Dallas Institute now more than ever. I am deeply honored to serve as the Institute’s first president.”
ut Ali is not a newcomer to the Institute nor its mission “to enrich and deepen the practical life of the city with the wisdom and imagination of humanities.” Back in the 1990s she was an assistant to the Institute’s co-founding fellows late Drs. Louise and Donald Cowan at the Institute’s Cowan’s Center™ (formerly known as Teachers Academy). From there she joined New York’s Museum of Modern Art staff, and returned to Dallas to serve as administrator for Teachers Academy while earning her Ph.D. at the University of Dallas’ (UD) Institute of Philosophic Studies. In the years that followed she taught at UD’s and John Cabot University’s Rome campuses, Morgan Statue University and Villanova University.
Most recently, Seemee and her husband Dr. Michael McShane taught at Carthage College in Kenosha, Wisconsin, where they were both recognized as Professors Emeriti and founded the “college’s vibrant Hannibal Lecture Series and established its Lincoln Forum for Liberal Arts.”
In addition to publishing essays on Homer’s “Iliad”, 20th century American writes Wallace Stevens and William Faulkner, Seemee has been “a regularly invited lecturer in the Newberry Library’s Teachers Consortium in Chicago.
In nominating Seemee for her role as fellow of Harvard University’s Center for Hellenic Studies, Harvard University’s Francis Jones Professor of Classical Greek Literature Dr. Gregory Nagy wrote, “I am in awe of her deep learning and her lively engagement with some of the most vitally important and timely topics in the field of classical studies.”
Despite all these commitments and accomplishments, she has still managed to frequently return to the Institute to lecture.
According to Larry, “After 40 years of conducting public programs in Dallas, the Institute is indeed fortunate to have Dr. Ali to lead it into its future. She has an intimate understanding of its mission in our city and what it has achieved, and she brings a dynamic vision for what it can and should become.”
As for Larry, he may be retiring, but he will still “remain involved with the important programs that he established over the course of his tenure, including this year’s Hiett Prize ceremonies and the 2021 MLK Symposium… He will continue leading his popular book groups and will sustain his commitment to enriching K-12 educators by teaching in the Cowan Center™.”
The Institute mission is with a mission “to enrich and deepen the practical life of the city with the wisdom and imagination of humanities.”
* Graphic/photo provided by The Dallas Institute of Humanities and Culture
Jenny King says
Dr. Ali is also a graduate of the liberal arts college in north Texas, Austin College (located an hour north of Dallas in Sherman, Texas). The Austin College community is thrilled for her to be back in town and in this new role. Thanks, too, for the giant impact of Dr. Larry Allums at the Institute.