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All faculty and eligible staff are invited to send me a letter proposing an idea for the next Obermann Humanities Symposium.
The Obermann Center welcomes ideas from junior as well as senior scholars, and from those not in humanities departments but who raise humanities questions or employ a humanities perspective.
Applicants may propose one symposium to be held in 2011-2012. We will make one award of $15,000.
Deadline: Tuesday, February 10, 2009
The purpose of the Obermann Humanities Symposium is to explore any important humanities topic that highlights UI scholars and scholarship. The proposed symposium may be interdisciplinary or involve the efforts of scholars from a single department, may involve few or many participants, and may use any format that produces a lively exchange of ideas. The symposium must include both UI and visiting discussants, must have some sessions open to all UI faculty, staff, and students, and must be designed to result in a publication: previous symposia have a terrific publication record.
Eligibility:
- All UI full-time tenured, tenure-track, and clinical faculty members are eligible to direct the symposium. Also eligible are all full-time UI Professional and Scientific staff members with the following qualifications: possess a terminal degree or equivalent experience; have a record of scholarship in the proposed area of the humanities; have a regular (versus temporary) appointment.
- Applicants may propose one symposium to be held in 2011-2012. Applicants who received a humanities symposium award in the last 4 years are not eligible to submit an application for this competition.
The Obermann Center will work closely with organizers to plan, publicize, and mount an engaging, and enriching event.
How to Apply
Develop a brief letter (1-2 pages single spaced), which gives the working title for the symposium, indicates which semester you were thinking of holding the symposium, describes how the symposium and resulting publication will advance humanities scholarship, identifies a few important humanities issues or questions that might be discussed, identifies some potential keynote speakers and names some UI faculty members who might be invited to speak or to help plan the event.
No budget is necessary at this time.
A review panel will review all letters using the following criteria:
- importance of the topic and the likelihood that the symposium will advance scholarship on the proposed topic;
- likely participation of UI humanities scholars as speakers and planners;
- likelihood that the symposium will lead to a published volume of essays or special issue of a journal;
- qualifications and record of relevant scholarship of the symposium director;
- if applicable, the published or creative results of any previous Obermann-sponsored project the applicant has directed.
Review committee members will evaluate the letters, and then they and I will meet with applicants who submitted the most promising ideas. Following the review, the panel will make a final recommendation.
Email your letter and a brief CV (3 pages maximum) directly to me (jay-semel@uiowa.edu, 335-4034) on or before Tuesday March 2, 2010.
Recent publications from previous Obermann Humanities Symposia include:
Barbara J. Eckstein and James A. Throgmorton, eds. Story and Sustainability: Planning, Practice, and Possibility for American Cities. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2003.
Rudi Colloredo-Mansfeld and Mark Peterson, eds. Fleeting Objects. Vol. VII, Special Issue of Journal of Material Culture, 2003.
Takis Poulakos and David Depew, eds. Isocrates and Civic Education. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press, 2004.
Ed Folsom, ed. Walt Whitman Quarterly Review, Special Double Issue; Whitman as a Bookmaker, 2006/2007.