The Humanists at Large (HAL) program at Stanford University was launched in 2020 in a collaboration between Stanford Career Education and the School of Humanities and Sciences. Please see our HAL 2026 cohort below.
2026 Bios
Caroline Bailey
Caroline is a fifth-year PhD candidate in English at Stanford. Her academic research looks at the impact of linguistic anthropology on the novel of the Americas, from roughly 1960 to the present. Outside of academia, Caroline is interested in letterpress printing and the production of artist's books, and you can often find her at the Stanford Community Print Shop.
Natalie Chaudhuri
Natalie Chaudhuri is a doctoral student in the Department of Political Science at Stanford. She researches legacies of violence during civil war and violence by organized crime on political behavior in Central America. Natalie holds a B.S.F.S. in Regional and Comparative Studies and an M.A. in Latin American Studies from Georgetown University.
Jennifer Depew
Jennifer Depew is a fifth-year PhD candidate in the History department. She studies the memory politics of the American Revolution in the late twentieth century. Her research sits at the intersection of memory studies and the history of conservatism. She also holds a JD from Stanford Law School. In her free time, she enjoys hiking, baking, and hanging out with her dog, Lana.
Matthew Gilbert
Matthew Gilbert is a singer-songwriter and scholar of twentieth-century American folk music. Currently a sixth-year PhD candidate in Ethnomusicology and a Dissertation Fellow at CCSRE, his research considers how issues of identity and geography impinge upon the stories we tell about music in the United States. He is the organizer of an amateur music ensemble called Social Art Project.
Hyunjip Kim
Hyunjip is a PhD candidate in Classics. He is a literary scholar, focusing on intellectual practice in ancient philosophy, on genre, and on digital humanities. He was Lecturer and Assistant Professor (and Air Force Officer) at the Republic of Korea Air Force Academy from 2020 to 2023. He has published in academic journals. Outside academia, he wrote a monthly column in Seoul Shinmun, a Korean daily newspaper, from 2018 to 2022. His articles were collected in his first book, 내 불운은 어디서 오는 것일까, which was published in Korea in February 2024. Last, Seloarts Gallery, in Seoul, Korea, hosted his first solo exhibition, Fate Hits Rock Bottom, in December 2024.
JJ Lugardo Marquez
JJ Lugardo Marquez is a fifth-year PhD candidate in Classics. Her research focuses on space, visibility, and social control in the ancient Greek world, with particular attention to carceral landscapes and practices in democratic Athens. She received her BA in Classics from Princeton University. Her dissertation examines the material, textual, and spatial evidence of imprisonment in fifth-century BCE Athens, including the use of mapping and 3D modeling tools to rethink the relationship between urban-rural space, punishment, and civic identity.
Reem Salem
Reem Salem is a third-year PhD student in Comparative Literature. She researches the reading and significance of Arabic literature during and after times of catastrophe. She believes literature has a great impact in creating hope, humanising oppressed peoples, and shaping history. She finds that telling stories is the most powerful method of connecting humans. She holds these core values and would like to explore them within academia and beyond. Reem also has years of experience teaching languages and academic writing. She finds interacting with students and witnessing their growth invigorating and rewarding. She hopes to benefit her immediate environment through her research and her work beyond academia.