BHF Draft - arts.hku.hk

Being Human is a
festival of the
humanities, first
of its kind in Asia

About Being Human Festival at HKU

Being Human Festival is an international event-based platform that celebrates and circulates humanities research through public engagement since its establishment in UK in 2014. As an Asia partner of the Festival, HKU will host its inaugural edition of Being Human Festival over three weekends from 7-21 November 2026. Being Human Festival at HKU aims to bring humanities research to communities beyond its campus, especially those that may not have access to tertiary education, through a series of dynamic events and activities in collaboration with local partners.

2026 Theme: Crossroads

Our festival theme in 2026 is Crossroads: a place of discovery, encounter and change. It is a theme shared by Being Human Festival centres across the globe, and one that Hong Kong knows intimately.

Hong Kong is itself a crossroads — a city where trade routes, cultures, and ways of life have long converged, and where the ancient and the contemporary exist, restlessly, side by side. It is a natural home for Being Human Festival, a global celebration of humanities research held across cities from London to Melbourne to North Carolina, which this year comes to Hong Kong for the first time.

To stand at a crossroads is never a neutral act. It is where different histories brush up against each other, where knowledge travels and changes in the travelling, where communities shape and are shaped by the ideas, objects, and practices that pass through them. Hong Kong knows this well; as a city that has absorbed and transformed everything that has moved through it, and sent it on its way changed.

A crossroads is also where worlds meet that don’t usually meet. A scholar and a neighbourhood. A craft tradition and a curious stranger. A poem and the moment it finds its reader. A recipe, a memory, and a new place. A contemplative practice and a new technology — perhaps even an artificial intelligence that asks us what it means to be human. It is where something is passed on, or changed, or discovered. It asks us to pause, and to pay attention.

This year, our events span the city and the senses: workshops, walks, conversations, performances, and shared meals. Whatever form they take, they share a common curiosity about the places where human lives, ideas, and knowledge intersect, and what becomes possible there.

Being Human Festival at HKU welcomes you to the crossroads.

2026 Programme Schedule

Coming Soon

Apr

Individual Programme 1

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Apr

Individual Programme 2

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Apr

Individual Programme 3

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Apr

Individual Programme 4

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