The Deep Read
Welcome to The Deep Read, an annual program of The Humanities Institute at UC Santa Cruz. We invite curious minds to think deeply about books and the most pressing issues of our contemporary moment.
As The Humanities Institute celebrates 25 years of helping students, scholars, and community members connect and work together to change the frame, this year’s book will help us reconsider the frames of reference for the American literary tradition.
This year, we are reading James by Percival Everett.
Winner of the 2024 National Book Award, James is a reimagining of Mark Twain’s Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Everett’s novel is a fugitive slave narrative told from the perspective of Twain’s enslaved character as he fights for freedom and dignity in an undignified world. Together, we’ll consider how Everett depicts the possibility of humanity in this novel about the brutality of slavery, the performance of race, and the value of language and literacy.
Sign up below to receive the Deep Read emails and info on the 2025 Deep Read events.
Join the Deep Read
Exploring James
Our program is grounded in deeply reading each year’s book with the help from UC Santa Cruz scholars. We will be guided by them in various faculty salon events and in four weekly email digests, which will begin in early April. We will read Percival Everett’s James together throughout the month of April.
Deep Read Scholars
We have enlisted a knowledgeable group of UC Santa Cruz professors who will help us read and analyze the book, understanding both its content and its contexts:
Vilashini Cooppan, Professor of Literature and Critical Race & Ethnic Studies, Deep Read Faculty Co-Lead
Susan Gillman, Professor of Literature
akua naru, Assistant Professor of Music
Greg O’Malley, Professor of History
Micah Perks, Professor of Literature
Karen Tei Yamashita, Professor Emerita of Literature
Email Explorations
We will develop four weekly emails that delve into different aspects of the book, guided by our Deep Read Scholars in History, Literature, and Music. In these emails, we’ll offer diverse perspectives on reading the book and offer various contexts for understanding it. Look for them in your inbox starting in early April. We will also link to them here as they are published.
Week 1: Conversations with Twain—James Speaks Back
Week 2: Doubled Voices—Language, Minstrelsy, and the Performance of Race
Week 3: History and Myth, Literacy and Resistance—Slavery in James
Week 4: Becoming James—Naming, Violence, and Unfinished Revolution
Salons and Author Event
Twain Faculty Salon: On February 11 at 6pm, we began our program with an online event on Mark Twain’s Adventures of Huckleberry Finn featuring Professor of Literature and Twain scholar, Susan Gillman. You can see Prof. Gillman’s talk slides here and view the event video here.
Craft Salon: On April 22 at 6pm, we hosted an online discussion focused on the writing craft of James. It was led by writers and Professors of Literature, Micah Perks and Karen Tei Yamashita. If you missed the event, you can watch the recording here.
James Faculty Salon: On April 29 at 6pm, we held a salon-style event at the Hay Barn on campus where our participating faculty, Professors Susan Gillman, akua naru, and Greg O’Malley, gave brief presentations and discussed James with the Deep Read community. Participants also attended virtually. If you missed the event, or would like to watch it again, you can find the recording here.
Regional Alumni Salons: We organized a number of salons across California for UC Santa Cruz alumni who wanted to connect with each other and discuss James. Our first Deep Read Alumni Salon took place in San Diego on April 15 at 6:30pm. Registration details here. Our second Alumni Salon took place in the East Bay on April 30 at 7pm. Registration details here.
Author Event – A Conversation with Percival Everett: On May 4 at 4pm, we welcomed Percival Everett to campus. He was in conversation with Professor of Literature and Deep Read Faculty Co-Lead, Vilashini Cooppan, at the Quarry Amphitheater. This was an in-person event and, as always, was free and open to the public. If you missed the event, look for the recording, which will be sent out to the Deep Read list to view for a limited time. If you are not yet on the list, you can sign up above!
Community Conversations
We’ll have online forums for each of the four weekly email explorations of the book where you can ask questions, post comments, and engage with fellow Deep Readers. You are also welcome to join the salons and the main author event to participate in the conversations that will happen there. Each Deep Read event has a dedicated Q&A period during which you’ll be able to pose questions, share ideas, and converse with UC Santa Cruz faculty and other participants.
The Deep Read Class
In Spring Quarter 2025, Deep Read Faculty Co-Lead and Program Manager, Laura Martin, will teach a course at Porter College for UC Santa Cruz students exploring James and Percival Everett’s other writings. Deep Read students will be invited to a special author event during Everett’s visit. Many insights from the class will be shared with the broader Deep Read community throughout the program.
Free Student Books
One of the hallmarks of the Deep Read program is that we offer free books to students every year. If you are a student and would like a free copy of James, please sign up for the Deep Read above and then come to the Humanities Dean’s Suite in Humanities 1 (5th floor) to claim your book at the following days and times.
Spring Quarter Book Pick-Ups:
Tuesdays, 10am-noon and 1-4pm
Wednesdays, 10am-noon and 1-4pm
Events of Interest
The campus often organizes events related to the Deep Read program. As they arise, you can find them listed here.
CAMPUS PARTNERS
The Humanities Institute
Alumni Engagement
College Scholars Program
Council of Provosts
Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
Humanities Division
Living Writers Series
Phi Beta Kappa
Porter College
Division of Student Affairs and Success
University Library
COMMUNITY PARTNERS
Bookshop Santa Cruz
De Anza College
Pacific Collegiate School
Santa Cruz High School
Soquel High School
MEDIA SPONSOR
Lookout Santa Cruz
A Humanities Institute Initiative
For 25 years, The Humanities Institute has fostered new frames of reference, changing how we see society, ourselves, and each other. With the help of the humanities, we can expand the limits of our perspectives—we can change the frame.
The Deep Read is our biggest platform for intellectual engagement, classes on campus, and major events with top writers and thinkers. We aim to foster thinking deeply across all mediums, driven by conversation and timely engagement with art, culture, politics, and scholars here at UC Santa Cruz who change the frame every day.
The Deep Read Program is made possible through the generous support of the Helen and Will Webster Foundation.
Past Deep Read Programs
In Spring 2024 we read Trust, the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Hernan Diaz. Trust pairs the music of the roaring 1920s with the staccato rhythm of the ticker tape in an exploration of how trusts, bonds, and other financial instruments of the early twentieth century penetrate the very core of human relationships and the stories we tell about them. Together we considered how the technologies of finance and fiction overlap in this novel about capitalism and its social, cultural, and political power in the U.S.
Exploring Trust
This program is all about reading deeply with the help from scholars at UC Santa Cruz. Over 4 weeks starting in late-April, we read Trust by Hernan Diaz together.
Deep Read Scholars
We enlisted a knowledgeable group of UC Santa Cruz professors who will help us analyze the book:
Lori Kletzer, Economics, Campus Provost and Executive Vice Chancellor
Madhavi Murty, Feminist Studies
Dard Neuman, Music
Zac Zimmer, Literature and Deep Read Faculty Lead
A Conversation with Hernan Diaz
This year’s program culminated in a live discussion of Trust with author Hernan Diaz in conversation with Deep Read Faculty Lead, Associate Professor of Literature Zac Zimmer on May 19 at the Kaiser Permanente Arena, Downtown Santa Cruz.
Email Explorations
There were weekly emails that dove into different aspects of the book, guided by our Deep Read Scholars in Literature, Economics, Feminist Studies, and Music:
Week 1: Let’s Read Trust
Week 2: Finance is a Liberal Art
Week 3: The Fiction of a Fiction
Week 4: Inversion of the Retrograde
Salons
Faculty Salon: On May 6, we hosted a salon-style event where our participating professors led a discussion of the book with UCSC students and the broader Deep Read community. Watch the video.
Craft Salon: On April 30, we hosted an online discussion focused on the writing craft of Trust. Watch the video.
Regional Alumni Salons: We hosted a number of salons planned up and down the California coast and in NYC.
- April 3: New York City | Details
- April 25: San Francisco Bay Area | Details
- May 8: San Diego | Details
Community Conversations
We’ll have online forums for each of the weekly explorations of the book where you can ask questions, post comments, and engage with fellow Deep Readers.
The Class
In Spring Quarter 2024, Lecturer and THI Program Manager Laura Martin will teach a course at Porter College for UCSC students exploring Trust and Hernan Diaz’s other writings. Many insights from the class will be shared with the broader Deep Read community throughout the program.
Events of Interest
Books and Boba
Friday, March 1 from 6-9pm at the Terry Freitas Commons: free books, boba, and snacks!
Unity in Diversity: A Celebration of Stevenson Core Course Book Themes
Wednesday, March 6 from 5pm-8 pm at the Cowell Stevenson Dining Hall.
Kresge College Night: Celebration of the Arts
Thursday, March 14, 2024 from 5pm-7pm at Porter/Kresge Dining Hall
CAMPUS PARTNERS
The Humanities Institute
Alumni Engagement
College Scholars Program
Council of Provosts
Humanities Division
Living Writers Series
Phi Beta Kappa
Porter College
Division of Student Affairs and Success
University Library
COMMUNITY PARTNERS
Bookshop Santa Cruz
Pacific Collegiate School
Santa Cruz High School
MEDIA SPONSOR
Lookout Santa Cruz
During the Spring of 2023, The Humanities Institute produced our fourth and largest annual Deep Read program focused on Pulitzer Prize-winning science journalist Elizabeth Kolbert’s book Under a White Sky. Over 8,500 students, alumni, faculty, staff, and readers around the world considered her perspective on the stark changes taking place in our world and explored the efforts we are making to adapt and survive in the era of climate change.
As we do every year, we read our annual text closely and comprehensively with the help from scholars at UC Santa Cruz. We read Elizabeth Kolbert’s book with the Deep Read community over 4 weeks, starting in late-April. Here are all the ways we engaged with the book:
Deep Read Scholars
We enlisted a knowledgeable group of UC Santa Cruz professors who helped us analyze the book from a variety of perspectives:
Jorge Menna Barreto, Environmental Art
Mike Beck, Marine Sciences, Director of the Center for Coastal Climate Resilience
Jody Biehl, Literature and Science Communication Program
Sikina Jinnah, Environmental Studies
Faculty Salon
On May 4, we hosted a salon-style event at the Cowell Hay Barn where our participating professors led a discussion of the book with UCSC students and the broader Deep Read community. Watch the video.
Elizabeth Kolbert in Conversation with Ezra Klein
This year’s program culminated in a live discussion of Under a White Sky with author Elizabeth Kolbert in conversation with NY Times columnist, podcast host, and alumnus Ezra Klein on May 21, 2023, at UC Santa Cruz’s Quarry Amphitheater. Over 750 Deep Readers attended the thought-provoking event. Watch the video.
Email Explorations
We produced 4 weekly emails that reflected on a different aspect of the book, guided by this year’s Deep Read scholars.
Community Salon
On June 7, we hosted a Community Salon at the Seymour Marine Discovery Center. Co-sponsored by Lookout Santa Cruz, this event focused on actions and projects that local organizations are taking in the face of climate change, providing ways for the community to engage locally with climate issues raised in Kolbert’s book. Ecology Action, Elkhorn Slough Foundation, and Regeneración Pajaro Valley led the discussion moderated by Jody Biehl. Watch the video.
The Class
This year’s Deep Read course—Climate Narratives: Elizabeth Kolbert and the Literature of Climate Change—featured climate journalist Elizabeth Kolbert’s climate journalism alongside other narrative genres, from film and comics about climate change to realist and dystopian climate fiction. It was taught by Laura Martin at Porter College. Students also had the opportunity to meet Elizabeth Kolbert during her visit to campus and engage with her and her work.
2023 Deep Read Partners
CAMPUS PARTNERS
The Humanities Institute
College Scholars Program
Division of Student Affairs and Success
Council of Provosts
Center for Coastal Climate Resilience
Climate Coalition
Confronting Climate Change Conference
Living Writers Series
Phi Beta Kapa
Porter College
Seymour Marine Discovery Center
University Library
University Relations
COMMUNITY PARTNERS
Bookshop Santa Cruz
Ecology Action
Pacific Collegiate School
Regeneración Pajaro Valley
Santa Cruz High School
Santa Cruz Museum of Natural History
The 2022 Deep Read program focused on Yaa Gyasi’s Transcendent Kingdom and explored the conditions of cultural assimilation for immigrants to the United States, religious faith vs. scientific inquiry, and the experience of first-generation students in higher education.
Read the Good Times cover story!
Catch up on our weekly explorations:
Week 1: Let’s Dig In / Week 2: Dilemmas of Identity
Week 3: Memory & Form / Week 4: Integrating Faith & Science
A Conversation with Yaa Gyasi
On May 15, 2022 novelist Yaa Gyasi and UC Santa Cruz Professor Emerita of Literature Karen Tei Yamashita spoke at the Quarry Amphitheater, as we closed the book on the 2022 Deep Read exploration of Transcendent Kingdom. Watch the video.
Digging in to Transcendent Kingdom
This program is all about reading deeply with the help from scholars at UC Santa Cruz. Over 4 weeks starting in mid-April, we read Yaa Gyasi’s novel together.
Here’s what we did:
- Email Explorations
- Faculty Salon
On May 4 we hosted the 2022 Deep Read Salon where we discussed Yaa Gyasi’s Transcendent Kingdom with UCSC Chancellor Cynthia Larive, Vilashini Cooppan (Literature and Critical Race and Ethnic Studies) and Gina Athena Ulysse (Feminist Studies). Watch the video. - Community Conversations
We had online forums for each of the weekly explorations of the novel where Deep readers can poses questions, posted comments, and engaged with fellow Deep Readers.
In Spring Quarter 2022, Porter College hosted a course (PRTR 151A) for UCSC students titled “Yaa Gyasi and Contemporary African Diasporic Literature.” Students engaged with Gyasi as a Ghanaian American writer whose work is as interested in taking up established African American literary themes, such as trauma and the historical legacies of Atlantic slavery, as it is engaged with issues central to African Diasporic Literature, such as urban mobility and the difficulty African immigrants face navigating middle-class aspirations. Many insights from the class were shared with the broader Deep Read community throughout the program.
There There, by Tommy Orange
The 2021 Deep Read Program explored Tommy Orange’s novel There There. The novel depicts a variety of urban Native American characters living in Oakland, CA. We think this novel meets the need to think deeply about Native American life in our contemporary moment, helping us rethink Native experience and representation. It was also hailed by last year’s Deep Read author, Margaret Atwood, as “an astonishing literary debut.”
Digging in to There There
This program is all about reading deeply with help from scholars at UC Santa Cruz. Over 4 weeks in February, we’ll read Tommy Orange’s novel together.
Here’s what you can expect:
Email explorations
There were 4 weekly emails that dove into different aspects of the book, guided by UC Santa Cruz professors in the Humanities and Social Sciences. Catch up here:
Week 1: Let’s Find the There There
Week 2: Against Assimilation
Week 3: Real Stories
Week 4: Native Hubs
Salons
You’ll be able to join the conversation in a series of online salons, where our participating professors will discuss the book with UCSC students and the broader Deep Read community.
Community conversations
We’ll have online forums open for discussion of the weekly explorations of the novel.
Meet Tommy Orange
This year’s program will culminate with a live, online discussion with There There author Tommy Orange on March 3, 2021.
Deep Read scholars
We’ve enlisted a great group of UC Santa Cruz professors who will help us dig deeply into the novel:
- Mayanthi Fernando, Anthropology
- Katie Keliiaa, Feminist Studies & Indigenous Studies
- Micah Perks, Literature
- Renya Ramirez, Anthropology
- Jennifer Tseng, Literature
Salon Schedule
Thursday, February 18, 5:20 PM PST
Creative Writing professors Micah Perks and Jennifer Tseng will lead a conversation about the techniques at play in the novel. Watch the video.
Wednesday, February 24, 5:30 PM PST
Professors Mayanthi Fernando, Katie Keliiaa, and Renya Ramirez will participate in a salon-style conversation about the novel. Watch the video.
Thursday, February 25, 5:30 PM PST
Discuss the novel with members of the Amah Mutsun Tribal Band, the Indigenous tribe native to the Santa Cruz region. Watch the video.
The Class
In Winter Quarter 2021 Porter College will offer a course in conjunction with the College Scholars Program featuring Tommy Orange’s novel, “Tommy Orange, There There, and the New Native Renaissance.” In the course, students will explore how the power of collective storytelling and community activism is depicted in the struggle against the marginalization of Native life, the exploitation of Native lands, the continued erasure of Native experience from the historical record, and the legacies of genocide and occupation. Many insights from the class will be shared with the broader Deep Read community.
The Testaments
The Deep Read book for 2020 was Margaret Atwood’s latest Booker Prize-winning novel, The Testaments, a sequel to her 1985 classic The Handmaid’s Tale. With The Handmaid’s Tale now a critically acclaimed television series set to enter its fourth season, Atwood’s prescient prose depicting a dystopian future is more relevant than ever.
The program, which ran parallel with a class and events on campus, sharing insights from Literature, Feminist Studies, Engineering and Anthropology to bear on Atwood’s work. Informed by some of UC Santa Cruz’ brightest minds, The Deep Read expanded our understanding of The Testaments and modeled deep reading practices that will stimulate minds and foster intellectual engagement.
Catch up on the 4-week exploration of the book:
Week 1: Welcome to Gilead
Week 2: Feminist Intersections
Week 3: Toxic Bodies
Week 4: Atwood Answers
Margaret Atwood Live
Margaret Atwood joined the UC Santa Cruz community for a free, live, virtual event on Tuesday September 22.
The virtual Peggy Downes Baskin Ethics Lecture featured Atwood in conversation with UC Santa Cruz alumna, and New York Times bestselling author, Kate Schatz (Stevenson ‘01, Creative Writing). This event culminated months of in-depth programming and community engagement focused on Atwood’s latest Booker Prize-winning novel, The Testaments, a sequel to her 1985 classic The Handmaid’s Tale.
William “Bro” Adams (Ph.D. History of Consciousness ’82), Chair of the National Endowment for the Humanities from 2014 to 2017, was the event MC.
The Class
In Winter Quarter 2020, a Porter College course, offered in conjunction with the College Scholars Program, is exploring The Testaments and other works by Atwood. Students will attend the Santa Cruz Salon as part of their quarter-long engagement with Atwood’s work. Taught by UC Santa Cruz Literature Lecturer, Laura Martin, the course will inform the curriculum for the Deep Read community. Material developed for the course will be shared via community emails and online.
Salon Series—Santa Cruz
The Santa Cruz Salon at the UCSC Hay Barn on March 10 featured a conversation with three UCSC professors, each exploring The Testaments from a different angle.
Speakers
- David Draper, Statistics, Director of the College Scholars Program
- Marcia Ochoa, Feminist Studies
Andrew S. Mathews, Anthropology - Moderator: Laura Martin, Porter College
Deep Read 2020 Partners
UC Santa Cruz Campus
The Humanities Institute
College Scholars Program
Division of Student Success
Porter College
UCSC Council of Provosts
University Library
University Relations
Community