This article introduces the reader to current work at the intersection of classical studies and the public humanities. It begins from the observation that in recent years, efforts by classical scholars to relate to a wider public have intensified and taken on a new quality. Not so long ago, public-facing research was considered detrimental to “real” scholarship. By contrast, as this article sets out to show, there is now a growing interest in a true exchange of perspectives, knowledges, and methodologies with stakeholders outside of the confines of the academe. I argue that some of the most interesting work in this space emerges from the way in which the aims and objectives of the public humanities intersect with several trends currently driving classical studies. These include the emergence of the digital humanities, the maturing of classical reception studies, and the (often difficult) conversations around calls to “decolonize” the classics.

This article argues that a public education in method—specifically, close reading—is the only viable role for literary studies within the public humanities. Drawing on recent discussions about the uses of the public humanities—and setting itself against recent interventions that have proclaimed a different public role for public literary studies—this article takes the form of an overt but minimalist manifesto: it tries to make the minimal case for public literary studies that is sufficient to give it a public usefulness. In so doing, it breaks down previous efforts of understanding the utility of literary studies as related to literature’s utility, but also to large-scale interventionist ideals such as climate-change activism. It proposes close reading as training in public debate, as an exercise towards better public meaning-making, and thus as a signal contribution to the making of better democratic citizens in a deliberative public sphere.

Some humanities fields, understanding the growing importance and relevance of public work, have been relatively quick to incorporate teaching public work into their courses. But the arts have been slow to catch up, for example, the relatively recent fields of public musicology and public music theory. However, teaching students how to do public work and why it is important is often removed in favor of course coverage. The reality is that teaching students to do public-facing work can enhance a course’s coverage while also teaching valuable workforce skills, in or out of the arts. At a time when applied careers in the performing and visual arts are dwindling, it is crucial to include the pedagogy of public-facing work in one’s arts classroom to show students what careers are possible using their disciplinary knowledge. In this manifesto, I discuss the importance of teaching public arts methods with a view from my own field, public musicology. As a case study, I will show how teaching public musicology can be both incorporated into stand-alone courses and built into programs, as I have done in the only public musicology undergraduate program in the United States.