August 5, 2004 | Read Time: 1 minute
Foundations more than doubled the amount they provided to humanities projects from 1992 to 2002, according to a new report from the Foundation Center, in New York.
Foundation support for the humanities increased from $134-million in 1992 to $335-million in 2002.
But even that large gain failed to match overall foundation giving, which tripled during the period. And the overall share of giving for the humanities dwindled slightly over the decade, from 2.5 percent to 2.1 percent of total foundation dollars.
What’s more, literature and the study of classical and foreign languages received fewer grant dollars in 2002 than in 1992, the report found.
The report was commissioned by the American Academy of Arts & Sciences, in Cambridge, Mass. The report’s statistics are drawn from the Foundation Center’s analysis of grants of $10,000 or more made by approximately 1,000 of the largest private and community foundations.
The report found that almost half — 49 percent — of 2002 humanities grant dollars went to “historical activities” and humanities-oriented museum activities. The report said that the “vast majority” of grants for historical activities supported historical societies and historic preservation.
The number of foundations making grants for humanities projects grew by 37 percent, from 498 in 1992 to 683 in 2002, the report found.
Despite that growth, in 2002 one-fourth of humanities grant dollars came from just five institutions (listed in descending order of the amount given): the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, in New York; the Packard Humanities Institute, in Los Altos, Calif.; the Righteous Persons Foundation, in Santa Monica, Calif.; the Ford Foundation, in New York; and the Annenberg Foundation, in Radnor, Pa.
“Foundation Funding for the Humanities: An Overview of Current and Historical Trends” is available at both the Foundation Center’s Web site (http://fdncenter.org) and at the academy’s Web site (http://www.amacad.org).
