Prof David Lewis and Dr Nita Mishra launched a new sub-field, namely, 'Development Humanities' at the DSA Ireland 2025-26 Annual Conference in a panel discussion, entitled "Linking Development Studies with the Humanities", chaired by Dr Susan Murphy.
The aim of the panel was to propose a new field of Development Humanities: the idea of widening the scope of Development Studies beyond just economics and the other social sciences to engage more fully with the arts and humanities. The panel was a culmination of a series of meetings, with key development scholars and earlier works linking the two fields, prior to the launch event.
David Lewis introduced the theme, Charlotte Brown presented work from her recently completed LSE PhD on poetry and protest in Kakuma refugee camp in Uganda, and Nita Mishra spoke on poetry as 'an unusual and emancipatory source of qualitative data'. See more here.
In a recent paper, Prof Lewis, argues that building this kind of new interdisciplinary bridge would be a valuable step forward for our field in terms of research, teaching and practice. A Development Humanities approach would enable new perspectives on the moral and ethical dimensions of uncertainty and change and create more space for non-Western viewpoints and decolonization narratives. It would challenge the dehumanizing effects of managerialism, commercialization and resurgent techno-optimism in the field of development.