How do deans of humanities understand and enact societal engagement within their broader experiences of leading? A Danish case study

Globally, universities have experienced growing policy demands and societal expectations, including being engaged societal actors – with senior university leaders expected to strategically address these requirements. To understand the specificity of leadership around this issue, we focused on one disciplinary cluster, the humanities, often seen as particularly challenged regarding societal engagement. We asked: How do Deans of Faculties of Humanities in Denmark understand and enact university-societal engagement within their lived experience of negotiating multiple responsibilities? Our in-depth qualitative study demonstrated that they held distinct but clear views of their responsibilities as well as the personal values underpinning their actions. These two, their perspectives on their responsibilities and personal values, underlay how they understood and enacted societal engagement. The results offer a nuanced broad perspective of the humanities as deeply societally-embedded – despite contentious issues around national regulations and policies. These leaders and their faculties engaged with multiple social actors to build networks and collaborate on research demonstrating how universities and other societal actors can jointly address societal problems, while challenging the cultural narrative about a university-societal divide. In this way, they offer humanities and social sciences academics an encouraging view of university-societal engagement.