Research Day Celebration 2026
Monday, April 13, 2026 – 3:00 – 6:00pm
Walsh Library at the Rose Hill campus
O’Hare Room, 4th Floor
2691 Southern Blvd, Bronx, NY 10458
Organized by
Office of the Provost
Office of Research
University Research Council
Research Deans’ Council
Program
Introduction: George Hong, Chief Research Officer and Associate Provost for Research
Opening Remarks: Tania Tetlow, President
Award Presentation
Chair: Dennis Jacobs, Provost and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs
Distinguished Research Award in the Humanities
Distinguished Research Award in Interdisciplinary Studies
Distinguished Research Award for Junior Faculty
Distinguished Research Award in the Sciences and Mathematics
Distinguished Research Award in the Social Sciences
Keynote Speech
"Attention really is all you need"
Keynote Speaker: Professor D. Graham Burnett
History of Science, Princeton University
Abstract: One of the most important scientific articles in the history of artificial intelligence research, and one of the most cited papers overall, is “Attention is all you need.” Published in 2017, and authored by a group of Google researchers, this paper laid out a crucial insight concerning transformer architecture, and enabled modern large language models. But what is the “attention” of the title? In this talk, D. Graham Burnett, a historian of science and outspoken voice in the Attention Activism movement, will situate modern algorithmic attention with respect to the wider existential, social, and political significance of human attention — with a special focus on the unprecedented challenges of our moment.
Bio:
D. Graham Burnett is the Henry Charles Lea Professor of History and History of Science at Princeton University. He writes widely about technology, politics, and society, and he makes collaborative work at the intersection of the creative arts and the interpretive humanities. A recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship and awards from Mellon and other foundations, Burnett was a visiting artist at the Academy of Fine Arts in Helsinki, and recently served as the Distinguished Humanities Lecturer at Arizona State University.
He founded the non-profit “Institute for Sustained Attention” in 2015, which has become a significant standard-bearer for “Attention Activism,” a broad-based movement to push back against “human fracking” and the harms of the attention economy. In connection with this commitment, Burnett directs the Strother School of Radical Attention, in Brooklyn, and is an active part of the Friends of Attention coalition, which he helped launch in 2019.
Burnett’s recent books include: Twelve Theses on Attention, co-edited with Stevie Knauss (Princeton University Press, 2022); Scenes of Attention: Essays on Mind, Time, and the Senses, co-edited with Justin E. H. Smith (Columbia University Press, 2023); and ATTENSITY! A Manifesto of the Attention Liberation Movement, co-edited with Alyssa Loh and Peter Schmidt (Crown, 2026). He is associated with the ESTAR(SER) collective, and curated the “Practices of Attention” component of the 33rd Bienal de São Paulo. www.dgrahamburnett.net
Dinner will be served at the conclusion of Dr. Burnett’s keynote.
The registration link is at the top of this webpage. Students are welcome to attend this event.