The National Humanities Alliance awarded $28.1 million in grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) to support 204 humanities projects nationwide, including several in the field of anthropology. These grants will support individuals in their research and writing, while increasing access to their work.
NEH funding is vital to help support the research, teaching, and publicly engaged humanities work in the field of anthropology. The following are grants awarded to AAA members and individuals in the field of anthropology:
Oregon State University
Loren Davis
Center for Archaeology, Art History, and Artifacts
The creation of two laboratory facilities at Oregon State University in Corvallis, Oregon, for digital 3D scanning and artifact analysis, as well as collections facilities for the Indigenous Studies program.
Matching: $333,333
University of California, Los Angeles
Willeke, Wendrich
Creating an Interdepartmental Certificate in Cultural Heritage Research, Stewardship, and Restitution
A one-year project to design and implement a graduate certificate program in cultural heritage studies.
Grant: $124,688
St. Bonaventure University
Oleg Bychkov
Native American and Indigenous Studies in the General Education Curriculum
A three-year curricular and faculty development project in conjunction with the Seneca Nation to incorporate the teaching of Native American and Indigenous Studies into general education classes required for all first-year students.
Grant: $147,389
Texas Tech University
Suzanne Tapp
Expanding the Circle: Native American and Indigenous Studies, Faculty and curriculum development for a newly created Native American and Indigenous Studies certificate program, in collaboration with tribal historians in the region.
Grant: $110,013
Dine College
Karla Britton
Sacred Dinétah
A one-year forum series and subsequent digital publication project focused on the Navajo concepts of land and dwelling.
Grant: $150,000
Beloit College
Nicolette Meister
Capacity and Community Building Through Preservation and Access Training
A continuing education project that would develop two new online courses, fund 162 scholarships for staff and volunteers at smaller cultural heritage organizations, and offer two 12-month fellowships for graduates of the University of Illinois Chicago Museum and Exhibition Studies Graduate Program.
Grant: $349,971
Mississippi State University
Jordan Lynton
Developing a Decolonial Field School: Teaching Community-Engaged and Decolonial Collection and Preservation Methods
Implementation of a three-year, community-engaged field school located at Brush Arbor Cemetery in Starkville, Mississippi, a designated location on the National Register of Historic Places, to educate ten advanced undergraduate or graduate students and one research fellow in community-based anthropological and archeological research and methods.
Grant: $347,959
University of Montana
Kelly Dixon
Indigenizing Heritage Collections in Montana: Research, Education, and Mentoring the Next Generation of Stewards
A project to address challenges with determining cultural affiliation for objects with vague records. The project would use the University of Montana’s anthropological and humanities collections as a case study to develop a methodology for Indigenized collections handling.
Grant: $325,107
Dialogue Institute
David Krueger
Diversity in Early America Tour App
Historical and technical research for an app-based mobile walking tour about the diverse religious traditions in colonial and Revolutionary-era Philadelphia.
Grant: $30,000
University of Rhode Island
Amelia Moore
Augmenting Manissean Public Memory, Sense of Place, and Belonging on Block Island
Development of an AR walking tour and online map exploring the African American and Indigenous history of Block Island.
Grant: $29,953
Independent Arts and Media
Katy Long
“Repatriating” Mexican Americans in the 1930s
Prototyping a mobile app that combines an audio walking tour with augmented reality to interpret the Mexican American experience in 1930s Los Angeles.
Grant: $72,450
Matching: $27,550
University of New Mexico
Angelica Serna Jeri
The Huarochiri Manuscript Archive: The Experience of Writing and Speaking Quechua
Research and writing leading to a book highlighting the role of native Quechua speakers in the development of written Quechua, an indigenous South American language, during the colonial era.
Grant: $60,000
Xavier University of Louisiana
Kim Vaz-Deville
Spirituality of Resistance: African American Masking in Contemporary Mardi Gras
Research and writing of a book about the influence of spirituality on masking traditions in New Orleans Mardi Gras.
Grant: $60,000
University of California, Santa Cruz
Carla Hernandez Garavito
Reimagining Colonialism: A Local History of Community and Empire in the Peruvian Andes Between the Fifteenth and Eighteenth Centuries
Research and writing leading to a book about how the Andean inhabitants of Huarochirí responded to the Inkas’ domination and then to Spanish colonialism in Peru from the fifteenth to eighteenth centuries.
Grant: $45,000
Northern Arizona University
Jeffrey Berglund
A Journey of Striving: Literary and Creative Expressions of Diné (Navajo) Becoming
Research and writing of a book on how Diné (Navajo) principles of homeland, kinship, beauty, harmony, and shared memories are reflected in their literature, music, and film.
Grant: $60,000
Spelman College
Rebecca Kumar
Brown Looks: Theories of Brown Queer Filmmaking Since 9/11
Research and writing for two essays examining the self-representation of new categories of ethnic identification in U.S. media in the last twenty years.
Grant: $25,000
University of New Mexico
Sarah Davis-Secord
Encounter and Identity: Christians and Muslims in Early Medieval Italy, Research and writing leading to a book about social relations between Muslims and Christians in early medieval Italy (approximately 700–1000 CE).
Grant: $37,500.00
Pennsylvania State University
Matthew Restall
The Invention of Colonialism: Myths of Slavery and Settlement in the Imaginary Genesis of Belize and Yucatan
Research and writing leading to a book on Belizean and Latin American history from the sixteenth to nineteenth centuries, focusing on competing experiences of British, Spanish, African, and indigenous Mayan residents.
Grant: $60,000
Bard College
Maria Sonevytsky
Singing for Lenin in Soviet Ukraine: Children, Music, and the Communist Future
Research and writing leading to a book about Soviet education and children’s musical practices in Soviet Ukraine, from 1934 to 1991.
Grant: $40,000
American University of Beirut
Josh Carney
TV Costume Dramas and the Consumption of History in Turkey and Beyond
Research and writing of a monograph on how the Turkish national past is mediated through popular costume dramas in present-day Turkey and beyond.
Grant: $60,000
University of Nevada
Reno Prisca Gayles
An Ethnography of Argentina’s Black Social Movement
Research and writing leading to a book on how contemporary Argentinian activists have changed and engaged with the country’s pervasive denial of Black history and anti-Black sentiment.
Grant: $60,000
University of Illinois
Erin Riggs
An Archaeology of Refugee Resettlement
Research and writing leading to a book that examines the urban resettlement and homemaking of Partition refugees in Delhi, India, from 1947 to the present.
Grant: $30,000
University of Notre Dame
Catherine Bolten
Unknowing the World: Humans, Chimpanzees, and Climate Change in Sierra Leone
Research and writing leading to a book on the social dimensions of rapid climate change among six villages and two chimpanzee communities in Sierra Leone.
Grant: $60,000
University of Rochester
Andrew Cashner
The Earth Songs of the Seneca Nation
Research and writing towards a digital multimedia book on the Earth Songs of the Seneca Nation of Indians.
Grant: $60,000
Johns Hopkins University
Lisa Siraganian
The Personhood Problem, From Corporations to Trees: Synthesizing Political and Philosophical Debates on Persons
Research and writing leading to a book on legal and philosophical concepts on personhood—from humans to corporations, algorithms, animals, and the environment.
Grant: $60,000
Elizabeth Knott
Assessing Digitization Strategies for Mesopotamian Cylinder Seals
Research and writing leading to a web-based publication analyzing digitization strategies for Mesopotamian cylinder seals and other 3D historical objects.
Grant: $60,000
Kathryn Killackey
Visualizing the Late Formative (200 BC – 600 AD) at the World Heritage Site of Tiwanaku
Research, writing, and illustration leading to a web-based visualization of the World Heritage site of Tiwanaku, in Bolivia, during the Late Formative period (200 BC to 600 BCE).
Grant: $60,000
St. Olaf College
Vivian Choi
Tsunami and Civil War in Sri Lanka
Writing and revisions leading to a book that examines the social, political, and technological intersections between natural disaster and civil war in Sri Lanka.
Grant: $30,000
Indiana University, Bloomington
Marvin Sterling
Narrating the Afro-Japanese “Hafu” Experience: Race, Nation and Multipolar Globalization in Contemporary Japan
Research and writing leading to publication of articles and a book on the experiences of Afro-Japanese people in contemporary Japan, and their implications for the broader understanding of Japanese identity and Japan’s place in the international community.
Grant: $60,000