Kluge Fellowship in Digital Studies

Description

The John W. Kluge Center at the Library of Congress announces a new Kluge Fellowship in Digital Studies to examine the impact of the digital revolution on society, culture and international relations using the Library’s collections and resources.

History teaches that groundbreaking technological innovations can be agents of broad and profound change. Their transformative effect on society can be greater than is anticipated or originally understood. Innovations such as the printing press and aerial flight continue to affect every level of human experience. The digital revolution is another such transformation.

The Library’s John W. Kluge Center seeks proposals from scholars worldwide that will generate deep, empirically-grounded understanding of the consequences of the digital revolution on how people think, how society functions, and on international relations. Proposals may also explore and analyze emerging trends and new phenomena that may generate consequential changes in the future. All proposals must state the importance of the research to fundamental thinking about the human condition.

Scholars should include a discussion of how the resources of the Library of Congress will inform the intended research. Resources at the Library of Congress include:

• The National Digital Library with more than 30 million online documents in support of the study of the history and culture of the United States.
• The World Digital Library, a collaborative digitization of national and cultural treasures from countries worldwide.
• The Library of Congress web archiving program, which preserves millions of websites pertaining to significant events such as the terror attacks of 9/11 and United States Presidential elections.
• The National Digital Newspaper Program of 5 million newspaper pages.
• The Records of the U.S. Copyright Office, including digital deposits.
• The Law Library of Congress collection of more than 2.8 million law books and other legal resources.
• The Library’s general collection of 35 million volumes.
• The Library’s subscriptions to e-journals and electronic databases.
• The Twitter archive (expected to be available solely to on-site researchers in the coming years).

Scholars are encouraged to think creatively of how the Library’s collections may inform a study of the digital revolution’s impact on how we think, how we live, and how we relate to one another.

Eligibility
Open to scholars and practitioners worldwide.
Open to U.S. citizens or foreign nationals.
Open to scholars from all disciplines.
Ph.D. or other advanced terminal degree strongly preferred.
Tenure & Stipend
For residency up to eleven (11) months. Constraints of space and the desirability of accommodating the maximum number of Fellows may lead to an offer of fewer months than requested.
$4,200 per month, paid monthly by the Library of Congress, by means of electronic transfer to a U.S. bank account.
For residential research at the Library of Congress only.
Applications
Applicants must submit:

A completed application form, in English
A curriculum vitae (maximum 2 pages; additional pages will be discarded)
A complete project proposal, including:
- A single-paragraph abstract
- A statement of proposed research (maximum 3 pages)
- An explanation of why the Library of Congress is the appropriate venue for your research (maximum 1 paragraph)
- A bibliography of works you have consulted for your proposal
3 references with completed reference forms from people who have read the research proposal
Applicants should indicate the collections of the Library of Congress that will be used for research. Please do not use any staples for the mailed application materials; use paper clips instead.

Due Date
All applications must be received by 5:00 PM Eastern Standard Time on November 15, 2013. Please follow all instructions carefully.

Submission of applications by e-mail is preferred. Submit to scholarly@loc.gov. Print applications may be mailed to The John W. Kluge Center at the address at the bottom of this page. Please include an original application (signed)