News Story

Photo by Kate Snyder Most of us have heard the phrase “it takes a village” when it comes to childcare. This age-old saying holds true for some songbirds, and a new study has found that this “village” has evolutionary consequences for their songs. Birdsong is often framed as a sexually… Read More

Freshly brewed coffee. Cut grass. Campfires. Spring flowers. Reading these words may conjure a specific scent in your mind. Scent is everywhere, and there is a shared experience in how different cultures and individuals use and depict fragrance. A new exhibit currently on display at the Vanderbilt University Museum of… Read More

Steve Buckles, senior lecturer of economics, retired, died on January 10, 2026, in Nashville, Tennessee, at the age of 82. Born on June 11, 1943, in Kansas City, Missouri, Buckles received a bachelor’s degree from Grinnell College in 1965. Afterwards, he enrolled in the economics Ph.D. program at Vanderbilt. During… Read More

Jason Merchant, a national leader in higher education and vice provost for academic affairs at the University of Chicago, will be the new Searcy Family Dean of the College of Arts and Science. An internationally renowned, award-winning professor in the... Read More

Among the artifacts librarian Mary McSparran selected from Vanderbilt’s Special Collections and University Archives for a pop-up exhibit last fall were a NASA space suit and a journal listing books about UFOs. Neither would seem a likely choice for a l... Read More

Being able to tell whether an image is real or generated by AI may be something you’re born with: object recognition. “It’s a stable trait that helps people meet new perceptual challenges,” study author Professor Isabel Gauthier said. “We were shocked ... Read More

Photo by Lucius Outlaw Over the next year, Gertrude Conaway Vanderbilt Chair and Professor of Psychology Sohee Park will work to develop a novel approach to examine the nature of the body and the self in those with schizophrenia. Park will be conducting this research as part… Read More

Svalbard, Norway, a cluster of islands north of the Arctic Circle, is rich with paradox. A former international whaling base and subsequent site of extractive coal mining, Svalbard is now home to the Global Seed Vault, which stores more than one millio... Read More

Faculty experts Ole Molvig, assistant professor of history and cinema & media arts, and Jenny Davis, Gertrude Conoway Vanderbilt Professor of Sociology, respond to Vanderbilt students’ most pressing questions in this deep dive on all things artificial intelligence. Read More

Vanderbilt University has announced its fall 2025 recipients of the Seeding Success, Scaling Success and Rapid-Advancement MicroGrant Program awards, providing internal funding to help faculty launch new research directions, strengthen proposals and co... Read More

Two seniors in the College of Arts and Science and one Peabody College senior have been named 2026-2027 recipients of the Wattles Fellowship. The fellowship offers three women graduates from Vanderbilt University a one-year, fully integrated position i... Read More

The VCL Scholars serve as an integral part of the Vanderbilt Center for Languages' mission of fostering interdisciplinary work. Applicants may propose a program of research for publication, conference presentation, or the creation of a new academic ini... Read More

Two members of the Class of 2025, Benedict Ballman and Rui Huang, have been chosen for the 11th cohort of the highly selective Schwarzman Scholars international graduate fellowship program. The Schwarzman Scholars program focuses on tackling the world’... Read More

In the College of Arts and Science, teaching is a critical part of our mission, with our faculty at the heart of our school. Each year, we recognize our faculty for their dedication to not only teaching, but also for their mentorship and guidance. During the first faculty meeting of… Read More

Two seniors in the College of Arts and Science have been named 2026-2027 recipients of the Wattles Fellowship. The fellowship offers three women graduates from Vanderbilt University a one-year, fully integrated position in the London corporate risk management and insurance market. Meet the college’s two Wattles Fellows and learn about… Read More

Illustration by Liz Chagnon Artificial intelligence has become increasingly present in our everyday lives—embedded in our cell phones, popping up on social media platforms, and incorporated into many business operations. With this rapid adoption comes many emotions ranging from excitement about having a technological aid that makes life more efficient… Read More

Vanderbilt University’s Center for Global Democracy is the new U.S. institutional home for the Comparative Study of Election Surveys, a leading global resource for understanding elections and democratic governance. This move strengthens Vanderbilt’s le... Read More

Can you tell the difference between an artificial-intelligence-generated face and a real one? In an era of digital misinformation, where fabricated images can spread widely across news and social media, this skill is proving invaluable. A new study has found that a person’s object recognition ability, or the ability… Read More

Whether Major Jackson is teaching, writing or critiquing, at the center of his work is a voracious hunger for artful language—underpinned by a commitment to painting the quotidian in new and unexpected ways. Read More

Freedom is something many people in the world seek, but what factors contribute to a country being considered free? This is a question students in Associate Professor of Political Science Katherine Carroll’s course, Middle East Politics, explored by creating a mock report for Freedom House, a… Read More