About the ILA
Founded in 1952, Emory's Graduate Institute of the Liberal Arts (ILA) was one of the first interdisciplinary Ph.D. programs in the United States. Today, the ILA provides a unique, intellectual environment for the pursuit of research projects that cut across conventional academic boundaries. The Institute has a tradition of fostering emergent fields of study and has encouraged the practice of new modes of inquiry at Emory and beyond. It provides a challenging space for both faculty and students to pursue theoretically sophisticated and methodologically innovative studies of history, culture and society. 
The faculty of The Graduate Institute of the Liberal Arts includes notable scholarly practitioners of a wide array of kinds of research, including the roles of contemporary science and medicine in society; current theories of embodiment, gender and sexuality, including psychoanalysis and queer theory; anthropology, historical ethnography, and oral history; American Studies, emphasizing African American, Asian American, Native American, and southern regional cultures and popular culture; social memory and memorialization; intellectual history (ancient and modern); visual culture; digital media; and public scholarship.
Since its inception, the ILA has served as an incubator for emerging new fields of scholarship. Departments at Emory that began or found early homes within the ILA include African-American Studies, Comparative Literature, Film Studies, and Women's Studies. ILA faculty members and graduate students retain strong connections to these programs. In addition, ILA faculty members are active in scholarly initiatives associated with American Studies; African Studies; European Studies; Health, Science, and Humanities; Medieval Studies; Southern Studies; and LGBTQ Studies. (See Affiliated Programs.)
The ILA has a long and distinguished tradition of public scholarship and many alumni have put their interdisciplinary degrees to work in museums, foundations, and other public institutions.
The ILA is also home to the nationally recognized Psychoanalytic Studies Program, dedicated to studying the theory, application, and history of psychoanalytic thought and practice. The program draws faculty from Emory College of Arts and Sciences, the Law School, the Business School, the Department of Psychiatry in the School of Medicine, and the Candler School of Theology. Faculty affiliated with the Emory University Psychoanalytic Institute, the Atlanta Foundation for Psychoanalysis, and the Atlanta Psychoanalytic Society participate in the program, linking the academy with the psychiatric and psychoanalytic communities.
Last modified on: 12/15/2010