Arriola is elected NRCP Division 11-Humanities Chair

Prof. Joyce L. Arriola, Ph.D., a Professor of Literature and Communication at the Faculty of Arts and Letters and Program Lead of Literature, Communication and Marketing Communication at the UST Graduate School, has been elected Chair of Division 11-Humanities of the National Research Council of the Philippines (NRCP).

As member of the Governing Board of the NRCP, Arriola will participate in the crafting of policy directions affecting the country in general and the disciplines in the Humanities in particular. The Humanities Division is one of the 13 scientific divisions in the NRCP representing the different disciplines of study. A Division Chair serves for two years per term, and she will serve from April 1, 2023 up to March 31, 2025. The disciplines represented in the Division of Humanities include literature, language, visual arts, architecture, music, performance studies, media arts, film, cultural heritage, among others.

Arriola has outlined her vision for the NRCP Division of the Humanities in the campaign material posted at the NRCP Facebook page. To quote the said material, Arriola said that she envisions “to spearhead an institutional self-assessment of the Humanities Division in order to take stock of its potentials and trajectories. This shall hopefully assist in pursuing the following proposed flagship domains for improvement:

1. To re-appreciate the nature and characteristics of research in Philippine humanities, arts and culture as these are viewed in relation to and in harmony with the other disciplines in the Council;
2. To craft a Research Excellence Framework for the Division that will be the basis of its indicators for research productivity and assessment;
3. To review its current assessment criteria in relation with the international metrics and their implications on the discipline;
4. To align current performance indicators and assessment criteria with the Division’s prospective Research Excellence Framework;
5. To harness the concepts of New Humanities as a starting point for charting the directions of pure and applied research in the field;
6. To harmonize the Division’s efforts with those of the Social Sciences;
7. To align the research agenda of the Division with that of the NRCP’s National Integrated Basic Research Agenda 2022-2028, particularly the Inclusive Nation-Building ATIN Agenda;
8. To update efforts to re-codify research ethics in the humanities, particularly in matters pertaining to Intellectual Property, Freedom of Information and Data Privacy;
9. To identify niche areas for relevant research and publication; and
10. To influence cultural policy-making, particularly in the areas of regional culture, creative arts, design industry and cultural mapping.”

Arriola was awarded the NRCP Distinctive Achievement Award in the Humanities in 2018. Her book titled Pelikulang Komiks: Toward a Theory of Filipino Film Adaptation (University of the Philippines Press, 2019) was awarded an Outstanding Book Award by the National Academy of Science and Technology in 2021.
She will be succeeding Dr. Hope S. Yu of the University of San Carlos who served as Chair of the Division of Humanities from 2019 to 2023.