DUKE FACULTY FELLOWSHIPS, 2010-11

Deadline: November 9, 2009

The 2010-11 Franklin Humanities Institute Annual Seminar, Expression/Performance/Behavior: Rethinking the Humanities, will be co-convened by Duke faculty Toril Moi and Paul Griffiths. The FHI offers up to six fellowships each year for members of the Duke faculty. Fellows participate in the FHI Annual Seminar, and are provided with release time equivalent to two courses and office space in the Franklin Center. The fellows’ home departments are provided with a subsidy for teaching replacement costs. Faculty members in the humanities, interpretive social sciences and arts are encouraged to apply, and faculty members in other areas may apply in many cases. One fellowship position is designated for members of the faculty in Duke’s professional schools.

Seminar Project Description

Questions about language, meaning and interpretation, and about the relationship between individual acts of expression (performances, behaviors) and their social, political and institutional contexts are fundamental to the humanities. Humanists analyze, historicize, and theorize the records and traces of human expressions, performances and behaviors. Traditionally we have worked with records of the way human beings talk and act, above all with documents and texts. Yet every kind of expression is important to the humanities: our field of interest ranges from voice, language, gesture, and movement to every form of art (painting, literature, theater, film, music, etc.) and philosophy. What we humanists do and make — our words, our texts, our own performances, behaviors and expressions — also belong to what we study. Thus the university, and its humanistic disciplines, must themselves be inquired into by humanists.

The 2010-11 Franklin Humanities Institute Seminar proposes to gather a group of scholars interested in reconsidering fundamental paradigms of meaning and practice in the humanities. While the co-conveners’ own starting point is inspired by Wittgenstein’s question of how one knows how to go on, to perform the next move, to behave in the appropriate way, to express what needs to be expressed as it ought to be expressed, the seminar will not be limited to one philosophical project. Rather, we want to make space for three kinds of work: work on fundamental theoretical issues concerning meaning and language; work that connects questions of meaning, language, expression (etc.) to fundamental questions of art and aesthetics (what painting, literature, theater, film, music and other art forms are; what these art forms can do); and work attempting to analyze and theorize the expressions, behaviors, and performances of humanists themselves.

For a complete project description, visit this page or download a PDF of the call for proposal.

We seek applications from humanists working in any discipline (including those who doubt the continued usefulness of the idea of a discipline), and on materials of any (humanistic) kind, from any time or place. The principal qualifications are an eagerness to arrive, through close conversation with others, at a deeper understanding of the possibilities open to the humanities today, and an interest in how those possibilities are informed and shaped both by what humanists direct their attention to and by our most basic assumptions about human expressions, performances and behavior. We welcome applications from scholars who wish to begin new projects in the seminar’s areas of interest, as well as those whose current projects may benefit from or be reshaped by attention to the seminar’s concerns. In either case, applicants should explain how what they’ll be working on during the seminar year relates to the topic of the seminar.

The seminar will meet weekly throughout the academic year 2010-2011. Some meetings will be devoted to presentations by participants, some to discussion of shared readings, and some to visits by non-participants, whether from Duke or beyond.

The 2010-11 FHI Seminar will be comprised of: (a) a total of eight faculty fellows from the College of Arts & Sciences; (b) one faculty member from Duke’s professional schools; (c) a professional librarian from the Duke libraries; (d) up to two Duke graduate fellows; and (e) a fellow from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Please click on the links above for more information on each fellowship category, or write to christina.chia@duke.edu.

Eligibility and Participation

All tenured, tenure-track and regular rank Duke faculty members are eligible to apply for fellowships in the FHI seminar. We are committed to diversity in the fullest sense of the word, and as in all previous seminars, we shall be looking for a mix of junior and senior faculty from a range of departments in the humanities and social sciences, whose work spans a broad spectrum of methodologies and historical periods. Faculty fellows will be appointed for the 2009-10 academic year. In exchange for participation in the seminar, the FHI will arrange for release from two courses, and will provide each fellow’s department with a subvention to offset teaching replacement costs. The seminar is provided with funding to support visiting speakers, small conferences/symposia, and other programs. FHI staff members provide logistical and technical support, programmatic support, and administrative support.

All tenured, tenure-track and regular rank Duke faculty members are eligible to apply for fellowships in the FHI seminar. We are committed to diversity in the fullest sense of the word, and as in all previous seminars, we shall be looking for a mix of junior and senior faculty from a range of departments in the humanities and social sciences, whose work spans a broad spectrum of methodologies and historical periods. Faculty fellows will be appointed for the 2010-11 academic year. In exchange for participation in the seminar, the FHI will arrange for release from two courses, and will provide each fellow’s department with a subvention to offset teaching replacement costs. The seminar is provided with funding to support visiting speakers, small conferences/symposia, and other programs. FHI staff members provide logistical and technical support, programmatic support, and administrative support.

Faculty fellows will be expected to participate actively in weekly meetings and programs, to provide input and suggestions on visiting speakers, readings, and topics, and to contribute as needed in the coordination of seminar programs and projects. Fellows are strongly encouraged to draw from their seminar experience to develop an interdisciplinary course designed to have an impact on curriculum development in the humanities. Courses may be team-taught and designed for any Duke student constituency (graduate, undergraduate, MALS, etc.), and should take place within three academic years of the conclusion of the seminar. If feasible, fellows may teach a related course during the spring semester of the FHI Seminar, allowing students to take advantage of the visiting speakers and programs offered by the Seminar.

The Proposal and Selection Process

1. A letter-form proposal, with original signature, of 1500 words or less that describes: (a) your current or new research project; (b) the ways in which your work connects with the theme of the seminar; (c) your teaching goals and the ways in which your participation in the seminar might support your work in the classroom; and (d) a description of a course or special project you might develop as a result of your participation in the seminar. Please address your letter-form proposal to the seminar co-conveners Paul Griffiths and Toril Moi, at the address below.

2. A current curriculum vitae and a short biographical summary.

3. A letter, with original signature, from your department chair agreeing to release time equivalent to two courses in academic year 2010-11.

The complete proposal with original signatures must be received by the Franklin Humanities Institute by 5:00 PM on Monday, November 9, 2009. Proposals should be delivered to:

Professors Paul Griffiths and Toril Moi
c/o Christina Chia, Assistant Director
John Hope Franklin Humanities Institute
Box 90403, 2204 Erwin Road

The seminar co-conveners and the Director of the Franklin Humanities Institute will review all proposals and forward their recommendations to the Dean of Humanities, who will make the final decisions. Fellowship appointments will be announced in Spring 2010.

For more information on the FHI Annual Seminar, including previous seminar themes, co-conveners, and fellows, please visit the Seminar’s main page here and explore the links.

If you have questions about this call for proposals, or if you need additional information, please write to christina.chia@duke.edu or call (919) 668-1902.