A key element of the College's space plan is to rededicate Kinsey Hall to the Division of Humanities, creating a new home for the Department of English and several other Humanities units. This historic move will be the Division's most important physical event since the Wesovood campus opened in 1929. The name of E. Lee Kinsey, former chair of the Physics Department, will move at the request of the Physics faculty to the Science Teaching Pavilion just south of Knudsen Hall, readying one of UCLA's original buildings for a new name. Generous support from a College benefactor will name this new site for learning and teaching in the Humanities.

The Humanities are the heart of a well-rounded education: the transformation of Kinsey Hall will put many Humanities departments in the historic heart of the Westwood campus.

Classics, Linguistics, Philosophy and other departments in the Division are among the best in the world. The English Department, renowned for its outstanding teachers and distinguished scholars, offers the largest undergraduate program in the country. The UCLA Humanities Consortium, created in 1996 by Dean Pauline Yu, provides an avenue for addressing society's pressing issues, fostering debate across diverse disciplines and forging new relationships between humanities scholarship and the public at large.

Undergraduate and graduate students of the Humanities learn about languages, literature, philosophy and the world's diverse cultures and traditions. Students reflect on the human condition, from the classical to the contemporary. They learn the skills of critical inquiry and effective expression. Ultimately they understand how people from different times and different places have viewed themselves and their worlds.

Faculty in the Division study ideas and values as they grow and change concretely in time and space. Humanities students expand their knowledge and explain their thoughts with greater clarity and and richer imagination, preparing themselves for productive and informed lives in civil society. Faculty will thrive as teachers and scholars in the space that the new Humanities Building will provide. New conferencing areas will foster student and faculty interaction. State-of-the-art classrooms will be wired to support multimedia.