Rare Book School Summer 2026 Courses

Rare Book School (RBS) is accepting applications for its summer 2026 courses. This year’s schedule features almost 50 in-person and online courses, including nine new courses. Courses in Charlottesville will once again be offered at RBS’s home in the University of Virginia’s Edgar Shannon Library.

RBS has launched new partnerships and course locations this summer: York in the United Kingdom, North Bennet Street School in Boston, and the University of Texas at Austin’s Harry Ransom Center.

In addition, you might be interested to know that we have two courses running in Chicago this summer:

• A History of the Indigenous Book in the Americas: North of the Rio Grande (H-150), taught by Will Hansen & Robert Warrior at the Newberry Library
• Censorship from the Inquisition to the Present (H-205), taught by Ada Palmer at the University of Chicago.

Applications are reviewed on a rolling basis until all available seats have filled.

To learn more about the courses offered this summer, click on the course titles to view detailed descriptions and faculty biographies, along with the schedule, format, location, and fee for each offering. For courses that have run before, be sure to consult the evaluations written by past students to gain further insight into the course.

Applications will be accepted through the myRBS system; instructions for using the site can be found on the landing page once you’ve created an account. For information about the application process, visit rarebookschool.org/admissions-awards/application. If you have any questions, please contact rbsprograms@virginia.edu.

We look forward to welcoming you to an RBS course this summer!