American Studies across Borders: International Opportunities for PhDs and Postdocs
International experience has become a prerequisite for success in academia – but depending on how you look at it, this can be exciting and terrifying in equal measure. In the second interview of this series, I talk to Dr. David Bosold of the John-F.-Kennedy-Institute Berlin about transatlantic relationships, career development, and dreams of meeting US footballers.
Continue ReadingIntroducing ‘The American South’: A Free Online Course from the Institute of Humanities at Northumbria University
On 31 October 2016, over 4,600 learners across the world will begin a unique, five-week online education experience. Encouraged to ponder all things southern – from Martin Luther King, Jr. to the mint julep – these learners will explore this most intriguing yet often maligned region of the United States, guided by experts from the Institute of Humanities at Northumbria University.
Continue ReadingIn The Fields Of Democracy: The Midwest In World War I
World War I generated a new narrative in American national identity. The easterly crusade to save the Old World, or, in President Wilson’s words, to make the world ‘safe for democracy’, reversed the nation’s foundational movement of western exploration and settlement leading away from Europe.[i] As Joseph Urgo describes it, ‘[t]he close of the old frontier’ was followed by ‘the opening of the global imperial frontier’, inaugurating America’s status as a superpower.
Continue ReadingMy Research across Borders: Lonneke Geerlings
‘My Research’ is a new feature that aims to introduce and summarise the research of Postgraduates and Early Career Researchers within the field of American and Canadian Studies. Sit back, and get to know some of the craziest, challenging, and rewarding places researchers have been taken to…
Continue ReadingApplication Advice: BAAS Postgraduate Travel Award
I have applied for the BAAS Postgraduate Travel Award twice, and this year I was lucky enough to win. The Award contributed towards a research trip to the United States to access archival source material and undertake oral histories for my thesis, which centres on attempts at multiracial organising around reproductive rights since the second wave of feminism.
Continue ReadingAward Experience: BAAS Postgraduate Travel Award
When I found out I had been awarded the BAAS Postgraduate Travel Award my first feeling was, unsurprisingly, elation. As a student of nineteenth-century U.S. politics I viewed my proposed two week visit to the Library of Congress, Washington D.C., as a pilgrimage to my research Mecca. But beneath my excitement was a ripple of uncertainty.
Continue ReadingAmerican Studies across Borders: International Opportunities for PhDs and Postdocs
International experience has become a prerequisite for success in academia – but depending on how you look at it, this can be exciting and terrifying in equal measure. I’m launching a new USSO series about how to take your research across borders, talking to representatives of those institutions and programs that can help PhDs and postdocs build an international profile. The Terra Foundation for American Art is my first interview partner.
Continue ReadingApplication Advice: Gerald Ford Presidential Foundation
This month I am visiting the United States for eighteen days to conduct primary source research central to my PhD thesis, ‘Spies, civil liberties and the Senate: the 1975 Church Committee’. It is the first time I have been to the US, and it is mainly due to the award I received from the Gerald Ford Presidential Foundation that I am able to spend such a significant amount of time there.
Continue ReadingApplication Advice: Eccles Centre European Postgraduate Award
Writing applications can be a scary undertaking, especially if you have only recently graduated and cannot yet boast with an impressive list of publications or extensive work experience in any specific area. You might even feel that you have not achieved anything truly noteworthy so far – except, maybe, making it through college alive.
Continue ReadingApplying for Research Funding: Four Key Principles
I have had some success in this area, having raised funds during my PhD and the first five years of my career from the AHRC, BAAS, the British Academy, Duke University, the University of Edinburgh, the Fulbright Commission, and the University of Nottingham. I have also served on the committee of HOTCUS, for which I have judged postgraduate travel awards on several occasions.
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