The Radcliffe Institute announced its 2026–27 cohort of Radcliffe fellows this week.
Each year, the fellowship—one of the most prestigious at Harvard—brings together scholars, scientists, artists, and writers to tackle projects with the support of the University’s academic community and research resources. This year’s class will engage subjects ranging from the way generative AI affects cognition to what birdsong reveals about human speech.
“At a time when higher education has been under heightened scrutiny, our new fellowship class offers hope and purpose,” said Harvard Radcliffe Institute Dean Tomiko Brown-Nagin, who is also the Paul professor of constitutional law at Harvard Law School. “Their work is a reminder of the vital importance of scholarly exploration and advanced study.” Nine fellows in the incoming class will also contribute to Radcliffe’s initiative on Academic Freedom and Connecting Across Difference, reflecting the institute’s growing emphasis on dialogue across political and ideological divides.
Among this year’s fellows is legal and literary scholar Elizabeth S. Anker, who will write an account of the “theory era” and how theories have shaped political and social life around the world. Historical musicologist Brigid Cohen will produce the first scholarly monograph dedicated to Yoko Ono, while also examining the relationship between music, philosophy, and politics during the past eight decades.
Several projects investigate the relationship between technology and the human mind. Neuroscientist and biomedical engineer Arij Daou will study the connections between birdsong and the neural foundations of human speech and memory, while research scientist Nataliya Kosmyna will explore how technologies such as smartphones, TikTok, and generative AI reshape cognition, creativity, and human agency.
Several fellows will focus on projects in medicine and healthcare. Surgical roboticist Loris Fichera, for instance, will collaborate with Harvard physicists to design flexible, tentacled surgical robots using advanced metamaterials. Physician and literary scholar Lakshmi Krishnan will trace how detective fiction helped shape the development of modern medical diagnosis, arguing that clinical reasoning owes as much to narrative imagination as to the scientific method.
The incoming group of fellows also includes major voices in contemporary literature. Poet, author, and essayist Ocean Vuong will work on an inter-genre project combining prose and photography to explore grief, masculinity, memory, and Asian American visual history. Pulitzer Prize–winning author Ilyon Woo will begin work on a new book inspired by a Korean social studies primer reproduced by her grandfather on the eve of the Korean War.
Climate and environmental justice are other important themes for the new class. Five fellows are pursuing projects connected to planetary health through the Radcliffe-Salata Climate Justice Fellowship, including environmental planner Marccus D. Hendricks, whose work examines how Baltimore’s sewer infrastructure created social exclusion, and legal scholar Jessica A. Shoemaker, who studies conflicts over farmland and Indigenous land claims, as well as the ways in which property law shapes rural landscapes.
The fellows include five Harvard faculty members:
Erica Chenoweth, Stanton professor of the First Amendment at Harvard Kennedy School, plans to examine how governments and social movements may use artificial intelligence to affect democratic organizing.
Erika Lee, Bae family professor of history, will work on a book exploring Asian American monuments and historic sites, and the role of public memory in contemporary civic life.
Maya Sen, professor of public policy at Harvard Kennedy School, will pursue a project focused on Indian American politics, analyzing how questions of race, identity, and political affiliation intersect within an evolving U.S. political landscape.
Tracey K. Smith, Boylston professor of rhetoric and oratory and professor of African American studies—and the former poet laureate of the United States—will examine consciousness and awareness in the work of the novelist and essayist Lucille Clifton.
Tracey E. Hucks, Thomas professor of Africana religious studies at Harvard Divinity School, will study the diversity of vernacular and esoteric religious practices of African American women.
