Applying for Fellowships and Grants
to
Support Graduate Study and Research
1) What are fellowships, dissertation fellowships, grants and post-doctoral fellowships?
a) Fellowships are generally year-long funding for MA or PhD, which award your record and abilities. They sometimes include money for travel to collections.
b) Dissertation fellowships award your record and abilities, but also your project. In this sense, they are more like grants.
c)Grants are monies to fund specific research projects, and often cover travel, equipment and supplies, and sometimes living expenses.
d) Post-doctoral fellowships fund research beyond the dissertation, generally a new project, often at a center with other scholars.
2) Why apply?
All fellowships and grants are highly competitive, but even though there are many people seeking a small number of awards, you do have a chance to win an award that will ease your teaching load for a year or two and enable you to progress more quickly through your degree. Even in you do not succeed in obtaining the award, the experience of applying can help you more clearly focus and clarify your short- and long-range scholarly plans. Often you can receive helpful feedback that will enable you to apply again for the same grant with more success.
3) How to find out about fellowships and grants?
a) Use the MIDAS database of funding sources.
b) Pay attention to email notices for funding from Martha Hurd & Jessi Aaron
c) Browse the bulletin board notices outside your department.
d) Look at the list at the end of this document.
4) Some hints about the application process:
a) PLAN AHEAD! Especially for grants, you will need a long time to develop a project, establish contacts, and get useful feedback from professors.
b) Read the fellowship or grant description and instructions thoroughly and follow them to the letter!
c) Give recommenders at least two weeks before the deadline, and supply them with your statement of intent or purpose, an unofficial transcript and a CV early on. Ask for feedback on your statement and project description.
d) Remember that you are writing your statement of intent and project proposal for very busy selection committee members who are not in your discipline and probably do not know its language or methodology. Write for a well-educated generalist.
e) Read models; often funding bodies include examples on their website.
f) In talking about your research (grant / dissertation fellowship proposals) or your field of study (fellowships), answer the big three questions: (1) What are you going to learn from this work? (2) Why is it worth knowing? (3) How will we know the conclusions are valid? Also clarify what related research has already been done and how yours is both sound and original.
g) When writing a budget (for grants), be very specific about what you need and why (including make and model for any equipment, airline you will travel with, itinerary, hotel, and exact prices).
h) If you will be working with human subjects, you will have to get approval from the Human Subjects Institutional Review Board.
5. Two excellent sources of more information on proposal-writing:
Przeworski, Adam and Frank Saloman. “The Art of Writing Proposals: Some Candid Suggestions for Applicants to Social Science Research Council Competitions”
Peters, Ann and Lise Menn. 2003. “Guidelines for writing grant proposals”
Fray Angélico Chávez Fellowship
| Purpose |
Awarded to a graduate student for work in the collection of Spanish documents at the Center for Southwest Research. Funded by the UNM Center for Regional Studies. $12,000 for one year, to work 20 hours per week. |
| Eligibility |
Graduate student enrolled and in good standing in residence at UNM, who can demonstrate paleographic skills |
| Deadline |
July |
| More information |
Center for Southwest Research |
FLAS (Foreign Language Area Studies) Title VI Year-long fellowships
| Purpose |
At UNM: to support the study of Portuguese and Latin American Indigenous Languages. The language must be taught at UNM (Quiché, Quichua) |
| Eligibility |
Graduate student standing; primary focus Latin America; US citizen or permanent resident; preference to MA and early PhD study; preference to those for whom the target language is central to MA/PhD focus. Stipend of $14,000 plus tuition and fees. |
| Deadline |
February 18; to Department by February 4 |
| More information |
FLAS Title VI summer language study fellowships
| Purpose |
To support the study of lesser-taught languages in Latin
America; |
| Eligibility |
Graduate students who plan to study Portuguese or Indigenous Languages in Latin America in programs of at least 140 contact hours. Preference given to students for whom this language acquisition is central to the graduate study program. |
| Deadline |
March |
| More information |
LAII 801 Yale |
Graduate Dean’s Dissertation Fellowship
| Purpose |
To support dissertation writing; $8,000; 5 awarded annually |
| Eligibility |
ABD, anticipate finishing dissertation within award year Nomination from department |
| Deadline |
March 1 |
| More information |
Graduate Scholarship Program
| Purpose |
To increase graduate enrollment at public post secondary institutions, particularly among those students who are minorities and women. $7,500 / year. |
| Eligibility |
New Mexico residents who are graduate students enrolled at a New Mexico four-year public postsecondary institution. |
| Deadline |
March 1 |
| More information |
LAII PhD fellowships
| Purpose |
To facilitate rapid progress towards the PhD; highly competitive, only for the top students |
| Eligibility |
PhD students (at any stage of PhD program) whose scholarship
focuses on Latin American Studies or related fields; awarded on
a yearly basis, with the possibility for extension for up to 3 years; |
| Deadline |
February 18; to Department by February 4 (applicants must be nominated and ranked by the Department; preference is given to continuing fellows) |
| More information |
LAII 801 Yale, gulliver@unm.edu |
LAII Field Research Grants
| Purpose |
To conduct field research in Latin America, Spain or Portugal for 4-8 weeks; not intended for dissertation research but as a ‘seed’ grant to support preliminary research leading to funding from other sources Applicants are required to apply for supplemental funding, e.g. SRAC or RPT International and in-country travel funded; must have a specific project and contacts in the field; supporting letters from those contacts are encouraged |
| Eligibility |
Graduate students |
| Deadline |
For spring: October; for summer and fall: March |
| More information |
GPSA Student Research and Conference Travel Grant (SRAC)
| Purpose |
Support for research or travel to conferences (including
airfare, per diem, conference registration, software; not including
equipment) |
| Eligibility |
Graduate students; research must be directly related to area of study |
| Deadline |
12 midday, 5th Friday of Fall / Spring semester; 1st Friday of summer semester February 18 2005 (February 4 to the Department) |
| More information |
Graduate and Professional Student Association of UNM (GPSA) http://www.unm.edu/~gpsa/srac.htm (look out on website for SRAC workshops and sample applications) |
GPSA Specialized Travel Grant (ST)
| Purpose |
To help graduate students with travel expenses (only) not
covered by SRAC; includes travel related to applicant’s professional
growth and development, e.g. interviews, workshops and anything
that is not classified as a conference; |
| Eligibility |
Graduate students |
| Deadline |
12 midday, 5th Friday of Fall / Spring semester; 1st Friday of summer semester February 18 2005 (February 4 to the Department) |
| More information |
Graduate and Professional Student Association of UNM (GPSA) http://www.unm.edu/~gpsa/st.htm (sample applications available on website) |
OGS Research Project and Travel Grant (RPT)
| Purpose |
To support field research: up to $1000 for materials, equipment, airfare, accommodation, living expenses while in the field; may only apply once per year |
| Eligibility |
Full-time or part-time graduate student in good academic standing |
| Deadline |
September (for the fall) and January (for the spring) January 24 2005 (January 10 to Department) |
| More information |
Office of Graduate Studies (OGS) |
Ford Foundation Fellowships
Through its program of Diversity Fellowships, the Ford Foundation seeks to increase the diversity of the nation’s college and university faculties by increasing their ethnic and racial diversity, to maximize the educational benefits of diversity, and to increase the number of professors who can and will use diversity as a resource for enriching the education of all students.
Ford Foundation Diversity Fellowships – Predoctoral Competition
| Purpose |
To support studies in the doctoral program; $17,000 plus tuition & fees |
| Eligibility |
Membership in one of the following groups: Alaska Natives, Black/African Americans, Mexican Americans/Chicanas/Chicanos, Native American Indians, Native Pacific Islanders, Puerto Ricans |
| Deadline |
Nov. 17 |
| More information |
http://www7.nationalacademies.org/fellowships/Ford_Fellows_Home_Page.html |
Ford Foundation Diversity Fellowships - Dissertation Competition
| Purpose |
To support dissertation research; $21,000 |
| Eligibility |
Membership in one of the following groups: Alaska Natives, Black/African Americans, Mexican Americans/Chicanas/Chicanos, Native American Indians, Native Pacific Islanders, Puerto Ricans |
| Deadline |
Dec. 1 |
| More information |
http://www7.nationalacademies.org/fellowships/Ford_Fellows_Home_Page.html |
Ford Foundation Diversity Fellowships - Postdoctoral Competition
| Purpose |
To support post-doctoral research; $40,000 |
| Eligibility |
Membership in one of the following groups: Alaska Natives, Black/African Americans, Mexican Americans/Chicanas/Chicanos, Native American Indians, Native Pacific Islanders, Puerto Ricans |
| Deadline |
Dec. 15 |
| More information |
http://www7.nationalacademies.org/fellowships/Ford_Fellows_Home_Page.html |
Fulbright Fellowships for overseas research
| Purpose |
To support research overseas |
| Eligibility |
Graduating seniors and graduate students |
| More information |
Ken Carpenter, Ph.D.; Study Abroad Advisor |
Fulbright-Hays for doctoral dissertation research abroad
| Purpose |
To support dissertation research abroad; $15,000-$60,000 |
| Eligibility |
US citizen or permanent resident |
| Deadline |
October |
| More information |
Andrew W. Mellon Foundation
| Purpose |
To support dissertation research in the humanities in original sources; to enable dissertation writers to do research wherever the relevant sources may be; Max. $20,000 |
| Eligibility |
ABD; Plan to do dissertation research primarily in original source material in the holdings of archives, libraries, historical societies, museums, related repositories, or a combination. |
| Deadline |
Nov. 15 |
| More information |
Social Science Research Council International Dissertation Field Research Fellowships
| Purpose |
Provides support for social scientists and humanists conducting dissertation field research in all areas and regions of the world. Up to 50 fellowships. Support for nine to twelve months in the field, plus travel. Rarely exceed $20,000. No award for less than six months field work. |
| Eligibility |
Full-time graduate student in the humanities or social sciences, regardless of citizenship, enrolled in doctoral program in the US. Must be ABD by the time the fellowships begins. |
| Deadline |
October/November (Information for 2006 competition posted in July 2005) |
| More information |
Sample Research Proposal and Travel Grant Proposal narrative
The purpose of this project, which consists of an eight-week stay in Puebla, Mexico, is to collect data in the form of spontaneous conversation in order to conduct an in-depth study of future reference in the Spanish of Puebla, Mexico. This study will serve as the basis for my dissertation, which I will begin writing upon my return to New Mexico.
The development of future tenses in the world's languages is both widely discussed and little understood. Scholars in the Romance languages have argued for decades that there is a meaning difference between the older, synthetic future forms, like cantaré 'I will sing' and the newer, analytic future forms, like voy a cantar 'I am going to sing'. A third alternative for future, canto 'I sing' is also sometimes mentioned; when it is, it is said, again, to have a special meaning.
The argument that each of these forms has a special and separate meaning—which requires only one form per meaning—is contradicted by recent research in historical linguistics, particularly in the field of grammaticization, which has claimed that the analytic future is replacing the synthetic future in Romance languages, with a parallel move from 'will' to 'be going to' in English. It is said that this is a reflection of the universal tendency for newer forms to replace older ones. If one form is to eventually replace another, they must, at some point, have the same meaning.
Neither of these arguments, however, has been proven valid through the empirical study of contemporary language use. The former has been based primarily on invented sentences, and the latter on information available in grammars. Though both seem to be correct intuitively and based on the evidence that has been provided, there is scant research done on the interaction of meaning differences and the tendency for newer forms to replace older ones.
In the past couple of decades, linguists have come to recognize that, in order to study and characterize language accurately, we must study it in its natural habitat: conversation. Despite this emphasis on the value of natural, spontaneous conversation as data for linguistics research, there are still relatively few oral Spanish-language corpora widely available. In fact, the most recent collections of Mexican Spanish that are widely available to linguists are over a quarter of a century old. Even these, however, are not true spontaneous conversation, but instead are sociolinguistic interviews. There is ample evidence that, while sociolinguistic interviews do tend to eliminate much of the attention paid to speech, they do not elicit the most colloquial forms of speech, and thus do not offer a clear glimpse into the way people actually use language every day. Furthermore, sociolinguistic interviews tend to include mostly narratives, which, in turn, tend not to include the future tense. As far as I am aware, no corpus of spontaneous Mexican Spanish conversation has ever been collected and made available to linguists.
It is with this need in mind that I plan to collect spontaneous conversational data from 40 speakers in the state of Puebla, Mexico. Speakers will be chosen based on sociolinguistic factors such as age, sex, level of education, and socio-economic status, in order to obtain a representative sample of the population. I plan to use my status as a former resident in the community to contact potential participants in the study. The corpus I collect for this research will then be transcribed. A corpus of this size will provide the material crucial for my dissertation on the future tense in Mexican Spanish. Furthermore, it will surely provide data for many studies in my career. I plan to one day make this corpus widely available to other linguists.
This research will contribute significantly to our understandings of the nature of the shift of future tenses from one form to another and the division of labor of these forms. More importantly, this research will explore the larger question of linguistic universality versus particularity: how do language-specific (or language-family-specific) differences in meaning play a role in the manifestation of universal tendencies? This research will provide evidence on the degree of the universality of so-called universal tendencies when faced with natural data.