Academy in Exile

Deadline: April 30, 2019

Academy in Exile invites scholars at risk to apply for 12-month fellowships in Berlin and Essen. Eligible are scholars from any country, with a PhD in the humanities, social sciences, or law, who are at risk because of their academic work and/or civic engagement in human rights, democracy, and the pursuit of academic freedom. Academy in Exile fellowships provide scholars with the opportunity to reestablish their scholarship in Germany and to work on a research project of their own choosing in a multidisciplinary environment. Fellows will contribute to the research agenda and intellectual profile of the academy generally.

With funding support from the Volkswagen Foundation, Academy in Exile started in 2017 as a joint initiative of the Institute of Turkish Studies at the University of Duisburg-Essen, the Kulturwissenschaftliches Institut (Institute for Advanced Study in the Humanities / KWI) in Essen, and the Berlin-based Forum Transregionale Studien. The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation provides additional funding for a residency program on critical thinking at the Freie Universität Berlin. To date, Academy in Exile has supported 27 scholars at risk with long-term fellowships, emergency stipends, and a guest professorship.

The new five fellows of the academy will have the opportunity to either be affiliated with the Forum Transregionale Studien, Freie Universität or the KWI. The selection of fellows will be based on academic merit, risk assessment, and suitability for the respective programs in Essen and Berlin (see below).

Fellowships may start as early as July 1, 2019 and may be extended for an additional 12 months. The monthly stipend amounts to 2,500 EUR.

Please submit your application by April 30, 2019 in the following order:

• a letter that explains your motivation for applying to AiE, including the current circumstances of your risk and/or exile status. No proof or letter from a third party is required. However, if you are registered with IIE-Scholars at Risk Network, Scholar Rescue Fund or CARA, please indicate so in your letter. Please indicate if you have a preference for being affiliated with Academy in Exile in Essen or Berlin;
• a three-page research proposal;
• an updated curriculum vitae with a list of publications;
• a published journal article or chapter.

Please submit your application to Vera Kempa academy-in-exile@trafo-berlin.de as one PDF and name the file as follows: surname_first name. All applications will be dealt with in strict confidentiality.

The Berlin-based Forum Transregionale Studien is a research organization that promotes the internationalization of research in the humanities and social sciences. The Forum provides scope for collaboration among researchers with different regional and disciplinary perspectives and appoints researchers from all over the world as Fellows. In cooperation with universities and research institutions in Berlin and outside, it carries out research projects that examine other regions of the world and their relationship to Germany and Europe systematically and with new questions. It supports four research programs and initiatives: Art Histories and Aesthetic Practices, Zukunftsphilologie: Revisiting the Canons of Textual Scholarship, Prisma Ukraïna—Research Network Eastern Europe, and Europe in the Middle East—the Middle East in Europe (EUME).

The KWI (Kulturwissenschaftliches Institut / Institute for Advanced Study in the Humanities) in Essen promotes excellent interdisciplinary research in the humanities, social and cultural sciences and maintains close cooperations with regional, national and international partners. It conducts basic research on the principles of modern culture with regard to relevant questions of contemporary societies. Due to the rise of authoritarian governments targeting gender and sexuality-related research, Academy in Exile at the KWI particularly encourages applications from scholars specializing in gender studies.

The Freie Universität in Berlin hosts a program on critical thinking for Academy in Exilefellows. While continuing their independent research, residency fellows at the Freie Universität devise a program of public lectures and closed workshops to evaluate the history of critical thinking, its relationship to policies of higher education, and its renewed relevance for today. As a distinctive feature of this new program, fellows are piloting a teaching-acrossborders initiative.