HUMANITAS

UVA’s Undergraduate Journal of Human Rights

Our Mission

Humanitas is UVA’s Undergraduate Journal for Human Rights. Humanitas is latin for “humanity,” and represents ideals of compassion and kindness toward others. Our name embodies our mission to help UVA students engage in the global fight for human rights.

Humanitas provides a unique space for UVA students, not only to explore existing conversations on human rights, but also to shape human rights discourses themselves, by engaging in research, scholarship, and collaboration.

We are a bi-annual publication seeking to inform the university community about ongoing human rights abuses, the history of human rights, and how to get involved. Our writers work throughout the semester to produce interdisciplinary articles, combining journalism, history, legal analysis, philosophical discussion, and more. Our editors collaborate with writers to help them engage in meaningful human rights research and awareness-raising. Our advocacy and publicity teams support our mission by organizing fundraisers and advocacy events.

Our Values

  • Through our publication and advocacy efforts, Humanitas hopes to help the UVA student body become more tuned into ongoing human rights discourses. We value open discourse that allows for diversity of opinion and are concerned with facilitating human rights dialogue, rather than promoting a single narrative.

  • The term “Human Rights” is at once legal, philosophical, and historical. In light of this complexity, we encourage our writers to go beyond traditional disciplinary boundaries and incorporate investigative strategies from a number of disciplines, including journalism, legal studies, history, philosophy, and more.

  • We understand that many topics in human rights are sensitive subjects, and discussing them requires sensitivity, professionalism, and most importantly, thorough research. We strive to maintain a respectful and responsible environment in both our publication and our advocacy efforts.

  • It is never too late to join the fight for human rights! At Humanitas, we value passion and dedication to human rights, and that can come at any stage of one’s academic and extracurricular journey. The journey to becoming a lifelong proponent of human rights begins with a single step, and we are always pleased and proud to be that first step for some of our members.