We cannot ignore the fact that this second issue of the INSITE Journal, Social Beings, is arriving at a moment when heart-wrenching loss is being felt worldwide due to the health crisis. Besides the tragedy of lost lives, impacts are being felt in every part of society. No more or less than in other arenas of human endeavor, the role of culture is being questioned. In some cases, particularly those of “brick-and-mortar” institutions that depend on attracting and serving an attending public, questions may be existential; in other instances, perhaps INSITE is an example, doubts may seem more conceptual or philosophical. Likewise, many argue that this moment of pausing, contemplating, and doubting is inevitable and necessary. While that may be true, the price for adjustment and reflection is astonishingly high, and the payment is being demanded over too short a time.

               At INSITE, we have the enormous good fortune to be able to continue, without interruption, to work with our amazing staff and cadre of longtime collaborators refining existing projects, such as this Journal and the INSITE Archive, and developing new ones, such as VIEWPOINTS. While this is not where we would have predicted our focus would be at this point in the cycle of thinking about the evolution of INSITE, we are motivated by the challenge to construct our future initiative(s) through the lens of ethical imperatives being revealed by recent events.

                Our heartfelt gratitude goes out to the extraordinary group of writers, scholars, curators, and artists who contributed to Social Beings. We also thank the interlocutors who were invited to participate with the first round of reflections for VIEWPOINTS. We realize it was a big ask to request original material at this pivotal moment. As always, we are blessed to be working with a team, spirited by the commitment of Andrea Torreblanca, that truly operates as a cohesive unit—without adherence to perceived or constructed boundaries of responsibility, and with the common objective of expanding INSITE as a platform fostering public engagement.