It started with a string of questions: why could we analyze the French Revolution but not explain why Samoan families hold fa‘alavelave? Or why Māori has no plural ‘s’? Or why Vietnamese grandmothers burn joss paper every spring?

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The Living Lexicon started as a 501(c)(3) public humanities NPO for student thinkers and humanists to stretch the capacity of words in defining meaning. Founded in March 2023, it is a cross-cultural forum where humanities scholars embrace minority narratives and preserve micro-identity across generations.

 

Our mission is to revive the humanities as a conversation not confined to books but can spoken and shared. On this platform, we explore how history shapes the human condition,  how philosophy traces migration, how translation alters truth, and how silence resists power. Analyzing ethical dilemmas and archiving migrant voices, we wish to nurture a new kind of scholar: someone who listens deeply, writes with empathy, and sees language as possibility.