Mellon Foundation Endows Fellowships in the Humanities at Center for Americas
March 11, 2008
The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation has matched $1.5 million in funds raised by Wesleyan University to endow a permanent Postdoctoral Fellowship Program in the Humanities within the Center for the Americas.
Since 1998, postdoctoral fellows were hired on a year-to-year basis as grant funding allowed. The new endowment supports a two-person cohort and offers them opportunities for scholarly research and professional development. Their appointments, which begin in July 2008, are renewable for a second year.
Faculty are already reviewing applications, and are seeking a cultural anthropologist or historian whose research focuses on indigenous peoples in North America and a cultural anthropologist or interdisciplinary scholar whose research examines cultural productions in Latin America, with a preference for a focus on Brazil or the Caribbean.
In the past decade, Mellon Fellows have contributed to the Center for the Americas in substantial ways, Patricia Hill, professor of American studies and history, explains. Some have conducted research, sharing their findings with faculty colleagues and Wesleyan students. Others have organized the center's annual Americas Forum to address critical issues from a hemispheric vantage point. And yet other scholars have delivered audience-packed talks or participated in faculty colloquia.
Staff in University Relations sought support from a variety of outside sources, especially from alumni and friends interested in investing in the intellectual life of Wesleyan, specifically the humanities and Center for the Americas. The opportunity to add to Wesleyan’s endowment attracted four trustees to make significant gifts to the challenge.
“We are proud and pleased that our donors and the Mellon Foundation have joined together to once again support the comparative, interdisciplinary and international approach that encourages our students to explore the cultures and politics of the Americas in their hemispheric context,” says Claire Potter, chair of American Studies, director for the Center for the Americas, and professor of American studies and history.
The Mellon Postdoctoral Fellowship Program is designed to benefit the fellows and university alike. The fellows are offered intellectual interaction and professional development while on campus. Many of them gain their first teaching experience at Wesleyan, and others develop new pedagogical interests during the fellowship. Most go on to compete successfully for tenure-track jobs at prestigious institutions.
In addition, the fellows teach courses in their own areas of expertise, important fields that are currently not represented in regular university offerings. During the first year, each fellow will teach a small, research-related seminar and a larger lecture course that will offer students a broader understanding of the field. In the second year, each fellow will offer a self-designed course and team-teach a course with a comparative perspective.
The endowment provides fellows with an annual stipend, health benefits, research and travel funds.
Source: Olivia Bartlett, Wesleyan Connection.
