Applications must be submitted in a timely fashion, allowing the reviewer to submit a support letter prior to the close of the deadline at 5 PM on the posted day. If not submitted by the close of the deadline, a support letter may not be considered by the committee.

A complete applicant must include the follows:

• A narrative (1200 word maximum) outlining the project, including but not limited to the follow:
• Focus,
• Theoretical framework,
• Methods and sources,
• Preliminary results,
• Contributions to the applicant's field and the applicant's professional development
• If research supplement is requested, a brief budget outline with explanation of costs; and
• Abbreviated (two-page) curriculum vitae; and
• A letter of support from the applicant's supervisor (typically department head), assessing the merits of the proposed project and the prospects for completion within the applicant’s proposed research schedule, submitted independently of the applicant. Once the applicant submits their proposal, a prompt will be sent to the applicant’s supervisor. Following the prompt in the notice email, the letters of support may be uploaded to the electronic system. Letters of support will be treated confidentially. Letters must be uploaded to the system prior to 5 PM on the day of the published deadline.

Criteria for selection

• The quality of the specific research project and proposal is given the highest priority; and
• Evidence that the applicant will successfully complete the project in the time frame proposed along with the applicant's scholarly promise and achievements to date; and
• Evidence of the applicant's willingness to seek non-Taft research and/or travel funding for this research project.

• No more than one summer research fellowship may be awarded in any 24-month period.
• A supplement award may not be used for travel to academic meetings.
• A faculty member may not teach during the period of award.
• All grant funds must be expended exclusively in furtherance of the grant and all expenditures of grant funds must comply with university policies relating to financial transactions, including the Code of Conduct and, as discussed in the Code of Conduct, the ethics laws of the state of Ohio which prohibit certain private financial interests in university matters. University Rule 3361:10-17-03 (D).
• Full disclosure of non-Taft funds received for the proposed project, both inside and outside the university, is required. The grant must not duplicate other funds granted for the same purpose, except when a deficit in the project budget is anticipated even with such non-Taft funds.
• Where deviations from the approved application occur, the grantee must notify the Taft Faculty Chair in writing and receive written approval for the changes. Failure to comply with this rule will nullify the grant and require return of the award.
• A final report should be submitted to the Taft Faculty Chair within 30 days of the end of the grant period.
• Publications and creative work generated with the help of Taft grants should acknowledge the Charles Phelps Taft Research Center.
• Payment is processed through payroll and subject to standard withholdings (taxes and fringe benefits).

 Applications must be submitted in a timely fashion, allowing reviewers to submit support letters prior to the close of the deadline at 5 PM on the posted day. Support letters that arrive after the close of the posted deadline may not be considered by the committee.

A complete application must include the following:

• A narrative (1200 words maximum) outlining the project, including but not limited to:
• Context for understanding the projects contributions to the applicant's field and the applicant's professional development; and
• A detailed project / release schedule; and
• An account of the proposed final publication, performance or grant/ fellowship sought.
• If research supplement is requested, a brief budget outline with explanation of costs.
• Abbreviated (two-page) curriculum vitae.
• Two letters of support
• A letter of support from the applicant's department head assessing the merits of the proposed project and the prospects for completion within the Center Fellowship year. The letter must commit the Department to a full-year research assignment, which releases the faculty member from teaching and administrative duties.† Department Heads may support multiple applications.
• A letter from an outside expert in the applicant's field, evaluating the merits of the proposal, the project’s significance and contributions to the field, and prospects for publication/performance upon completion.
  
  NOTE: Once the applicant submits their proposal, a prompt will be sent to both the external evaluators and the applicant’s supervisor (typically department head). Following the prompts in the notice email, letters of support may be uploaded to the electronic system. Letters of support will be treated confidentially. All letters must be uploaded to the system prior to the 5 PM on the day of the published deadline. Support letters that arrive after the close of the posted deadline may not be considered by the committee.

• The quality or promise of quality of the applicant's work as a scholar or creative writer and as a teacher.
• The significance of the contribution that the proposed project will make to thought and knowledge in the field.
• The conceptualization, definition, organization, and description of the proposed project.
• The current state of the research, the research schedule, and the timeliness of the grant in ensuring the completion of the project.
• The likelihood that the applicant will complete the project.
• Evidence of productivity from previous Taft grants.

• Subject to approval of the Faculty Awards Committee, other support may be accepted concurrent with the Fellowship. Full disclosure of non-Taft funds received for the proposed project, both inside and outside the University, is required.
• The Fellowships is to be awarded as an extension of either sabbatical leave or department head-granted release and requires release from regular faculty duties during the Taft-funded semester. An award requires release from regular faculty duties, especially instruction and service responsibilities, during the Taft-funded semester.
• In compensation for release of the applicant, and grantee’s department receives $8,000, to be used toward sustaining the current curriculum, absent the released faculty member, and secondarily, up to 50% of the total award may be used to forward the research mission of the department, in whatever ways maximize the use of Taft funds for departments to best enable them to release the faculty member.
• All grant funds must be expended exclusively in furtherance of the grant and all expenditures of grant funds must comply with university policies relating to financial transactions, including the Code of Conduct and, as discussed in the Code of Conduct, the ethics laws of the state of Ohio which prohibit certain private financial interests in university matters. University Rule 3361:10-17-03 (D).
• Fellows agree to acknowledge support received from the Taft Fellowship in any publication/ performance resulting from the fellowship project.
• Grantees are ineligible to re-apply in the following two fiscal years.

Applications must include the following:

• A project statement (1000 word maximum) indicating the project:
  • Theoretical framework
  • Methods and sources
  • Preliminary / expected results
  • The significance of the project to your discipline
  • The significance of the project to your overarching research trajectory
• A brief budget outline with explanation and proof of costs
• Abbreviated (two-page) curriculum vitae.

The application portal closes at 5 PM on the day of published deadlines.

Applications will be assessed based upon the following criteria and priorities:

• The quality or promise of quality of the applicant's work as a scholar or creative writer and teacher.
• The significance of the contribution that the proposed project will make to thought and knowledge in the field of the project.
• The conceptualization, definition, organization, and description of the proposed project.
• The current state of the research, the proposed schedule, and the timeliness of the grant in ensuring the completion of the project.
• The likelihood that the applicant will complete the project.
• Evidence of productivity from previous Taft grants.
• Among the various project types, the committee assigns the highest priority to applications for a specific research project.
• The committee assigns a lower priority to applicants who have not sought funding outside of Taft for their projects or travel expenses.
• The committee assigns a lower priority to applications from prior grantees.
• The committee assigns a higher priority to applications from junior faculty.
• Emeriti may apply but will be given lower priority.

• Full disclosure of non-Taft funds received for the proposed project, from both within and outside of the university, is required. Taft grant must not duplicate other funds granted for the same purposes, except when a deficit in the project budget is anticipated even with such non-Taft funds.
• All grant funds must be expended exclusively in furtherance of the grant and all expenditures of grant funds must comply with university policies relating to financial transactions, including the Code of Conduct and, as discussed in the Code of Conduct, the ethics laws of the state of Ohio which prohibit certain private financial interests in university matters. University Rule 3361:10-17-03 (D).
• Where deviations from the approved application occur, the grantee must notify the Taft Faculty Chair in writing and receive written approval for the changes. Failure to comply with this rule will nullify the grant and require return of the award.
• Publications and creative work generated with the help of Taft grants should acknowledge the Charles Phelps Taft Research Center.
• A travel authorization request must be submitted and approved prior to travel, via Concur.
• Per university policy, receipts and travel reimbursement request must be submitted via Concur, within 30 calendar days of the conclusion of the trip.
• Travel for Research grants only fund non-local transportation (e.g. air, train, bus, or personal mileage), research related expenses, and per diem (including food and lodging, up to the maximum allowable by Taft - $150 per day - see rate information below).
• See the Reimbursement Procedures for additional information.

• Taft will only cover airfare, train fare, bus fare, or personal mileage, non-local ground transportation, research related expenses, and per diem (including food and lodging, up to the maximum allowable by Taft, of $150 per day).
• Taft will not reimburse expenses for alcohol.
• As you will be required to present receipts to obtain reimbursement, please be sure to retain itemized, original receipts.
• A travel authorization request must be submitted via Concur and approved prior to travel.
• Per university policy, receipts and travel reimbursement request must be submitted via Concur, within 30 calendar days of the conclusion of the trip.
• The total expenses claimed must not exceed the amount authorized and no unauthorized line items may be claimed.

• International Conference Travel grants only fund the conference fee, airfare, ground transportation to and from conference hotel, and per diem, which includes the maximum lodging rate as well as the meals and incidentals rate for a destination, per GSA, not to exceed Taft’s limit of $150 per day. The conference registration fee must be separated from any additional membership/ organization fees, unless membership fees are the only option and separation of the two fees is literally not possible.
• Full disclosure of non-Taft funds received for the proposed project, both inside and outside the university, is required. A Taft grant must not duplicate other funds granted for the same purpose, except when a deficit in the project budget is anticipated even with such non-Taft funds. For example, travel grants may supplement funds from non-Taft sources in cases where the necessary and reasonable costs exceed the established Taft limits.
• All grant funds must be expended exclusively in furtherance of the grant and all expenditures of grant funds must comply with university policies relating to financial transactions, including the Code of Conduct and, as discussed in the Code of Conduct, the ethics laws of the state of Ohio which prohibit certain private financial interests in university matters. University Rule 3361:10-17-03(D).
• Where deviations from the approved application occur, the grantee must notify the Taft Faculty Chair in writing and receive written approval for the changes. Failure to comply with this rule will nullify the grant and require return of the award.
• Publications and creative work generated with the help of Taft grants should acknowledge the Charles Phelps Taft Research Center.
• A travel authorization request must be submitted via Concur and approved prior to travel.
• Travel outside a 24-hour window of the conference start or end date is not generally permitted. Travel outside this period must be authorized by the Taft Faculty Chair prior to travel.
• Per university policy, receipts and travel reimbursement request must be submitted via Concur, within
• 30 calendar days of the conclusion of the trip.

• Travel outside a 24-hour window of the conference start or end date is not generally permitted. Travel outside this period must be authorized by the Taft Faculty Chair prior to travel. If travel outside this period is approved, approval should be submitted with a copy of travel costs for this period. Personal travel days should be removed from award costs.
• A travel authorization request must be submitted via Concur and approved prior to travel.
• For Taft, per diem includes the maximum lodging rate as well as the meals and incidentals rate for a destination, per GSA, not to exceed Taft’s limit of $150 per day. Only the federal rate for meals and incidental expenses (M&IE) may be claimed without receipts; lodging reimbursement requires an itemized receipt and proof of payment. If the combined daily lodging cost and M&IE rate are below the maximum reimbursement rate for Taft ($150 per day), individuals may only file for this lesser amount. If there is no lodging cost and the M&IE rate is below the maximum reimbursement rate for Taft ($150 per day), individuals may only file for this lesser amount.
• The total expenses claimed must not exceed the amount authorized and no unauthorized line items may be claimed.
• Per university policy, receipts and travel reimbursement request must be submitted via Concur, within 30 calendar days of the conclusion of the trip. Reimbursement for travel will not occur after 30 days except where funding is received only after travel has occurred.

Domestic Conference Travel grants are available for faculty presenting their own research or creative works, including posters, at established academic conferences. This grant does not support conference participation in other capacities (such as commentator, member of a discussion panel, or session chair). Faculty are eligible for up to $1,200 in domestic conference travel support each fiscal year (ending June 30). Grants cover non-local transportation by the most economical carrier (air, train, or personal car), conference registration fees, and hotel, for travel within the United States and its territories. Grants do provide local travel funding, i.e. travel to and from the airport or around the conference city.

Faculty may present at more than one conference during the academic year and are encouraged to combine travel to multiple conferences in close geographical proximity, when possible.

Program deadlines are rolling from mid-July to mid-June. Applications are not restricted to the same fiscal year, though yearly limits are measured by the fiscal year of the award, not the year of travel. In addition to populating all electronic fields, applicants must upload proof of costs, e.g. a travel website screen shot of airfare estimate or receipt and itinerary, conference registration page, and lodging registration.

• Domestic travel grants only fund transportation in the form of airline/train ticket or personal car mileage, conference registration fees, and lodging costs. The conference registration fee must be separated from any additional membership/ organization fees, unless membership fees are the only option and separation of the two fees is literally not possible.
• Full disclosure of non-Taft funds received for the proposed project, both inside and outside the university, is required. The grant must not duplicate other funds granted for the same purpose, except when a deficit in the project budget is anticipated even with such non-Taft funds. For example, travel grants may supplement funds from non-Taft sources in cases where the necessary and reasonable costs exceed the established Taft limits.
• All grant funds must be expended exclusively in furtherance of the grant and all expenditures of grant funds must comply with university policies relating to financial transactions, including the Code of Conduct and, as discussed in the Code of Conduct, the ethics laws of the state of Ohio which prohibit certain private financial interests in university matters. University Rule 3361:10-17-03(D).
• Where deviations from the approved application occur, the grantee must notify the Taft Faculty Chair in writing and receive written approval for the changes. Failure to comply with this rule will nullify the grant and require return of the award.
• Publications and creative work generated with the help of Taft grants should acknowledge the Charles Phelps Taft Research Center.
• A travel authorization request must be submitted via Concur and approved prior to travel.
• Travel outside a 24-hour window of the conference start or end date is not generally permitted. Travel outside this period must be authorized by the Taft Faculty Chair prior to travel.
• Per university policy, receipts and travel reimbursement request must be submitted via Concur, within 30 calendar days of the conclusion of the trip.

• Travel outside a 24-hour window of the conference start or end date is not generally permitted. Travel outside this period must be authorized by the Taft Faculty Chair prior to travel. If travel outside this period is approved, approval should be submitted with a copy of travel costs for this period. Personal travel days should be removed from award costs.
• A travel authorization request must be submitted via Concur and approved prior to travel.
• Travel by personal vehicle is reimbursed at the university rate ($0.58 per mile).
• The total expenses claimed cannot be more than authorized, nor can line items be claimed that were not authorized.
• Per university policy, receipts and travel reimbursement request must be submitted via Concur, within 30 calendar days of the conclusion of the trip. Reimbursement for travel will not occur after 30 days except where funding is received only after travel has occurred.

Terms of the grant

• Domestic travel grants only fund transportation in the form of airline/train ticket or personal car mileage, conference registration fees, and lodging costs. The conference registration fee must be separated from any additional membership/ organization fees, unless membership fees are the only option and separation of the two fees is literally not possible.
• Full disclosure of non-Taft funds received for the proposed project, both inside and outside the university, is required. The grant must not duplicate other funds granted for the same purpose, except when a deficit in the project budget is anticipated even with such non-Taft funds. For example, travel grants may supplement funds from non-Taft sources in cases where the necessary and reasonable costs exceed the established Taft limits.
• All grant funds must be expended exclusively in furtherance of the grant and all expenditures of grant funds must comply with university policies relating to financial transactions, including the Code of Conduct and, as discussed in the Code of Conduct, the ethics laws of the state of Ohio which prohibit certain private financial interests in university matters. University Rule 3361:10-17-03(D).
• Where deviations from the approved application occur, the grantee must notify the Taft Faculty Chair in writing and receive written approval for the changes. Failure to comply with this rule will nullify the grant and require return of the award.
• Publications and creative work generated with the help of Taft grants should acknowledge the Charles Phelps Taft Research Center.
• A travel authorization request must be submitted via Concur and approved prior to travel.
• Travel outside a 24-hour window of the conference start or end date is not generally permitted. Travel outside this period must be authorized by the Taft Faculty Chair prior to travel.
• Per university policy, receipts and travel reimbursement request must be submitted via Concur, within 30 calendar days of the conclusion of the trip.

Taft CoLABS

2018-2019

How do we impart knowledge at a time when information is instant, ubiquitous, and free? How do we prepare students for jobs that might not exist tomorrow? The rapid development of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and its convergence with other technologies will have profound effects on the future of work. Many job categories, including the professions, will be affected – and dramatic changes in economic, political and social life are inevitable. From a wide field of applicants across UC, five finalists were selected to present on these issues, including Dr. Richard Harknett (Political Science) and Dr. Zvi Biener (Philosophy).

Frida in Focus

University of Cincinnati Professor Emeritus Edward Silberstein enjoys a special connection to Kahlo through his father, the renowned photographer Bernard G. Silberstein . Over a three-day period in December of 1940. Silberstein photographed Kahlo and her husband, Diego Rivera. Edward Silberstein shared eight of his father’s photos for the “Frida in Focus” exhibit. Alongside Bernard G. Silberstein’s photos, the exhibit also featured 10 monographs that had published a selection of his portraits of Kahlo.

This marvelous opportunity was the result of the Department of Romance Languages and Literatures, under the leadership of Professor and Chair Carlos Gutierrez, working with the Taft Research Center, the UC Office of the Provost, the Office of the Vice President of Research, the Office of Diversity and Inclusion, and the McMicken College of Arts and Sciences

The Griffin Warrior of Pylos

Classics Faculty Jack David and Sharon Stocker attracted a staggering crowd to the Center to hear about their discovery of the ancient tomb of the Griffin Warrior from Pylos, Greece. Hailed in The New York Times as potentially being a “gateway to civilizations” and described as one of the most important Grecian digs within the last century, it is unsurprising that this event drew a packed house at Taft. Davis is the Carl W. Blegen Professor of Greek Archaeology and Stocker is a Senior Research Associate in the Department of Classics. Their discovery has shed light on how Minoan culture influenced the Mycenaeans.

Conversations in Classics: Culture as Casualty

Assistant Professor Marion Kruse, of the Classics Department, described ISIS’ destruction of the Syrian site of Palmyra. A UNESCO World Heritage Site, it had been one of the best-preserved ruins of the ancient, Roman trading post. He showed how modern warfare destroyed history’s creations. Associate Professor Sarah Jackson from the Department of Anthropology, discussed how sacred monuments, built for one function, can be later utilized by others for different purposes. For instance, Mayans built temples to honor their gods, and today, people from across the world, journey to these same temples for spiritual exercises; whilst others use the site as a backdrop for political protest. Professor HOLLY MCGEE spoke of the South African government’s forced relocation of Sophiatown’s black residents to make way for white settlers. Sophiatown was once, a thriving cultural hub just outside of Johannesburg. The country’s government destroyed this city’s rich, Black culture with its relocation policy.

The US Presidency and Our Common Future

The national Presidential election and President Donald Trump’s inauguration was contentious and divisive. It raised many issues concerning the future of religious freedom, the makeup of the Supreme Court, the state of US democracy, an inclusive US society, economic and environmental wellbeing, gender equality, and race relations. In this context, humanities research and scholarship provides an important platform to discuss, debate, and tackle the difficult topics plaguing a nation. As such, the Taft Research Center saw this as an opportunity to bring together different constituencies from across campus and the broader community to share their thoughts and concerns with the general public. The Office of Equity and Inclusion, the Center for Race, Gender, and Social Justice, and the McMicken College of Arts and Sciences co-sponsored the event.

January 24: Religious Diversity, Race Relations, and Immigration
Shakila Ahmad, the Islamic Center of Greater Cincinnati President
Ervin Matthew, from the Department of Sociology
Carlos Gutierrez, Chair of the Department of Romance Languages and Literatures 

January 31: US Economy, Environment, and Gender Relations
Debashis Pal, Chair of the Department of Economics
Adrian Parr, UNESCO Water Chair and Taft Research Center Director
Amy Lind, Mary Ellen Heintz Professor and Chair of the Department of Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies

February 7: Democracy, Freedom of the Press, and the future of the US Supreme Court 
Laura Jenkins, interim Chair of the Department of Political Science
Jeff Blevins, Chair of the Department of Journalism
Verna William, interim Dean of UC College of Law

BEN SOLOMON

Continuing the goal of deepening and expanding humanities based educational opportunities for the Cincinnati community, the Center worked with the University of Cincinnati Master of Public Health program and its Gamma Rho student chapter of the Delta Omega Public Health Honorary Society, the Department of Environmental Health, and the Graduate Student Governance Association to celebrate National Public Health Week. The focus was “Refugee Health.” Journalist Ben Solomon, of The New York Times, was part of a Pulitzer-winning team that covered many of the sobering and vivid stories on Ebola in Africa. Since 2011, Solomon has reported from more than 20 countries, including Tunisia, South Sudan, Afghanistan, Mali, Niger, Sierra Leone, and Syria. Not only did Solomon share his experiences of the Ebola outbreak, but he also spoke about his recent reporting in the wartorn Middle East. More specifically, he described the myriad challenges Syrian refugees face.

Louder Than A Bomb

Louder Than A Bomb is a Spoken Word contest where teenagers can voice their opinions, hopes, dreams, and fears. Through this event, teenagers are provided with an incredible opportunity to have their voices heard. The event is politically charged, emotionally moving, and artistically captivating. The Finals occurred on April 8 at the School for Creative and Performing Arts.

Lena Alpern of Walnut Hills High School took home first prize in the individual’s category; Miah Harvey of DePaul Cristo Rey took second prize; and Noelle O’Neal of Seven Hills took third place. In the team category, DePaul Cristo Rey High School took first place, Walnut Hills High School took second place, and Elementz won third place.

LTABcincy is sponsored by the Kroger Corporation, the Goldsmith Family, the Taft Research Center, the UC Office of Equity and Inclusion, and the McMicken College of Arts and Sciences. It is the result of a lively collaboration between Taft, Elementz, Cincinnati Public Schools, Seven Hills High School, and DePaul Cristo Rey High School.

Truth, Justice and the American Way?

Students, parents, and even legislators often prioritize educational paths that strike them as more "practical" or that are perceived to have more direct paths to employment. Even with the national push for science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) education, the emphasis has tended to be on applications rather than basic research. Nationally the number of majors in humanities and social sciences has plummeted in the past decade. Despite being the largest college at the University of Cincinnati, many students--and even many faculty--are unclear about what the College of Arts & Sciences has to offer. Such uncertainty is a widespread phenomenon, especially at public universities.

Yet this phenomenon is puzzling in light of the frequent essays and editorials in which corporate executives and political leaders emphasize the need for exactly the sort of education that is provided by study of Arts & Sciences.

This event will consist of several lectures beginning at 1pm. The main event and panel discussion will begin at 4pm with a reception following at Rhinegeist. For more information about this event and full event schedule, you may visit: http://www.artsci.uc.edu/truth

Theater of War

Theater of War is an innovative public health project that presents readings of Sophocles’ Ajax, an ancient Greek play about the suicide of a great and respected warrior, as a catalyst for facilitated town hall discussions about suicide, combat stress, alcohol and substance abuse, and the impact of war on families. The town hall-style discussion that follows the performance of scenes from Sophocles’ Ajax elicits first-person testimonials and powerful comments from service members of all ranks, with a special focus on the themes of suicide prevision and alcohol and substance abuse awareness. Community panel members who have struggled with and overcome combat stress, suicidal ideation, and alcohol and substance abuse kick off the conversation with their gut reactions to the play, relating the 2,500 year-old story to their own post-deployment experiences. Then, a skilled facilitator asks the audience a series of questions designed to pull out timeless themes from the story of Ajax.

Selected media:
NEA
The New Yorker
NPR
PBS
NYT

Bouchra Ouizguen: Corbeaux

Sept. 16 - 17, 7:30 PM
Contemporary Arts Center, Black Box Theater

In her work Corbeaux (‘crows’ or ‘ravens’), Moroccan choreographer Bouchra Ouizgen offers us an experience of immense intensity outside of a traditional theatre space. Out of the dark emerge figures dressed in black. Like birds they step forward, their heads wrapped in white headscarves that droop like beaks. They dance in an hypnotic rythm, singing with tempo-less voices, resting, then restarting. They undertake physical and vocal actions ranging from repetitions to variations, swelling up until they explode in the form of a vital, earthy cry from the womb.

Bouchra Ouizguen’s crows are women of different languages, cultures and origins. With the CAC, Compagnie O, the Marrakech dance group that came together during eight years of laboratory and performance work directed by Ouizguen, will be joined by women living in Greater Cincinnati. As in every town to which Corbeaux migrates, this collection of women is freed of the barriers of age, origin, and language, exchanging their personal histories in this shared commitment. They assemble to convey their feminine knowledge, bursting into the everyday spaces of the city and bowling the spectators over with their own cathartic rites before leaving them facing themselves once more.

Originally created for the 2014 Marrakech Biennale of Contemporary Art, Corbeaux has since been presented throughout Europe and West Asia, appearing at some of the world’s foremost contemporary arts centers and performance festivals. Wherever it goes, each venue is uniquely specific to the environment, and the pubic is never far away.

Support for the US tour of Corbeaux is provided by the French Institute in Paris (Institut Français à Paris); the French-US Exchange in Dance, a program of the New England Foundation for the Arts’ National Dance Project; the Cultural Services of the French Embassy in the United States; and FACE Foundation, with lead funding from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the Florence Gould Foundation, and the French Ministry of Culture and Communication. Additional support provided by the Hermès Foundation within the framework of the New Settings Program; This presentation is supported by the Arts Midwest Touring Fund, a program of Arts Midwest that is funded by the National Endowment for the Arts, with additional contributions from Ohio Arts Council and the Crane Group; and the Charles Phelps Taft Research Center at the University of Cincinnati.

For more information, visit the CAC event listing

34th National Conference on the Beginning Design Student

March 1-3, 2018

Keynote: Marcos Novak, Director of the transLAB and Professor of Media Arts and Technology at the University of California, Santa Barbara. 

An architect, artist, composer and theorist, Novak employs algorithmic techniques to design actual, virtual and hybrid intelligent environments. He is a pioneer in the field of transarchitecture.

Chatterjee Global Lectures series

Michael Murphy, co-founder and Executive Director, MASS Design Group

Michael Murphy regularly speaks on architecture and health care, and sits on the boards of the Clinton Global Initiative Advisory Committee, the Harvard Graduate School of Design Alumni Board, and the Center for Healthcare Design. Michael holds a Master in Architecture from the Harvard Graduate School of Design.

Eco-Judaisim

Some posit that Judaism promoted human entitlement to environmental exploitation (Gen 1:28); others suggest that it promotes responsibility for the earth (Gen 2:15, Deut 20:19-20, and other rabbinic texts). This lecture series explores talks on Jewish faith and environmentalism, rabbinic responses to drought and environmental crisis, and Zionism and the environment. The lectures considered contemporary Jewish approaches to environmental challenges with presentation on innovative readings of Jewish texts related to environmental ethics, cutting-edge attempts to connect Jews and nature, and current efforts to enlist environmental to solve contemporary Jewish challenges.

October 13
7:00 PM
Speaker: Hava Tirosh-Samuelson, Arizona State University
Title: Jewish Environmentalism: Faith, Scholarship, and Activism.
Location: Taft Research Center

November 2
7:00 PM
Speaker: Julia Watts Besler of Georgetown University
Title: Fasting, Prayer, and Protest: Rabbic Responses to Drought and Environmental Crisis
Location: Taft Research Center

January 19
2:45 PM
Speaker: Dr. Yedida Eisenstat, assistant professor at York University
Title: Against the Law: Rabbinic Law in Rashi’s Torah Commentary
Location: Taft Research Center

IFJP Conference

The fifth annual International Feminist Journal of Politics (IFJP) Conference, featured "BEING PRESENT 2016: seeking new feminisms against empire," the keynote address by Dr. Zillah Eisenstein, Ithaca College, one of the world’s foremost political theorists and activists of our time. The conference was followed by a call for papers for a special issue of IFJPl, guest edited by Anne Sisson Runyan, Professor of Political Science and Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies.

LTAB, which enjoyed an enormous first-year success, extended its reach to include 20 local schools and after-school programs and over 120 students. We hosted a crowd of more than 600 people at the LTAB finals, on April 9, at the School for Creative and Performing Arts Corbett Theater. Former Cincinnati Bengals player Dhani Jones and Malcolm London, who won the 2011 Chicago LTAB, co-hosted the event

International Žižek Studies Association Conference

The International Žižek Studies Association Conference is an internationally well-recognized and attended conference featuring addresses by Slavoj Žižek himself, Greg Harman, and Frances Restuccia, among others. Each is an internationally recognized expert in their field. Well over 100 scholars attended from across Canada, France, Germany, Mexico, Philippines, Slovenia, the United Arab Emirates, UK, and the USA.

May 27 – 29
Title: International Zizek Studies Association Conference: Materialism and Materiality
Location: Tangeman University Center

Date: May 27
Time: 6 to 7:30 PM
Speaker: Slavoj Žižek, University of Ljubljan
Title: Is God Dead, Unconscious, Evil, Impotent, Stupid...or Just Counterfactual?

Date: May 28
Time: 1:30 to 2:45 PM
Speaker: Kelly Agra, Jr. Keynote Speaker
Talk title: The Event Divides into Two or the Parallax of Change: Badiou, Žižek, Bosteels and Johnston

Time: 6 to 7:30 PM
Speaker: Frances Restuccia, Boston College
Talk title: Is the Gaze a State of Exception?

Date:May 29
Time:3 to 4:30 PM
Speaker: Graham Harman, American University
Talk title: On Žižek

Registration Information

Outspoken: Conscience and Responsibility

UC President Santa Ono, University of Kentucky President Dr. Eli Capilouto and Hebrew Union College - Jewish Institute of Religion President Aaron D. Panken will discuss respectful social responsibility and political discourse on public campuses. Monday, Jan. 26, at 4 PM, at Mayerson Hall, Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion.

Louder Than a Bomb: Youth Poetry Competition

semifinal competition
Wednesday, Mar. 25 - Saturday, Mar. 28
Location: DAAP 5400

Final Competition
Saturday, Apr 18 Location: Harriet Tubman Theater at the National Freedom Center

Disposable Life Project

video collection: now available

Are there aspects of contemporary global society that make it possible to think and act in ways that render specific populations "disposable"? How might we commemorate tragic events of the past in ways that will cultivate a deeper understanding of the conditions that give rise to extreme violence? We are pleased to announce that the first installment of the disposable life project, which tries to tackle such questions, is now available.

The "disposable life" project – a special series in the larger "histories of violence" project - is a reflection on the nature of violence and disposable life, in the face large-scale violence within the 20th century. January 2014 marks the 20thanniversary of the Zapatistas issuance of revolutionary laws, following their declaration of war on the “Mexican State” and the seizure of several towns and cities by armed insurgents. April 2014 marks the 20th anniversary of the Rwandan genocide, which exposed the horrifying legacy of colonialism and its long lasting implications.

June 2014 marks the 100th anniversary of the outbreak of World War I, one of the bloodiest conflicts in human history. 2015 marks the 70th anniversaries of the bombings of Hiroshima & Nagasaki, where perhaps as many as a quarter of a million people were killed; and the 100th anniversary of the Armenian “genocide,” ending the lives of an estimated one million+ persons; and the 65th anniversary of the start of the Korea War; the 60th anniversary of the US involvement in the Vietnam War; and the 40th anniversary of the beginning of the “killing fields” in Cambodia. January of 2015 marks the liberation of Auschwitz camp complex, where an estimated 1.1 million people were murdered.

A more just and peaceful future must move beyond the historicity of memorialization and reflect critically on the contemporary significance of events past, Disposability may take many different forms but it cannot be properly understood without engaging the underlying causes, which span political, economic, cultural, social, psychological and an identity-based nature.

The "disposable life" project begins with a talk from the celebrated feminist scholar Cynthia Enloe, who was recently hosted by Taft in the Fall of 2014. Enloe provides her original interpretation of the paradigm, exploring the idea of namelessness in relation to the concept of disposability. According to Enloe, "to be disposable is to be nameless in somebodies eyes. It is to have no recognized history."

This series is the result of a collaboration between the Charles Phelps Taft Research Center at the University of Cincinnati, the McMaster Center for Scholarship in the Public Interest; University of California Humanities Research Institute, the Rice Center for Critical and Cultural Theory (3CT), the Humanities Corridor Center New York, the Global Insecurities Centre and the University of Bristol, Centre for Critical Research on Race & Identity at the University of KwaZulu-Natal, and the Committee on Global Thought at Columbia University.

Histories of violence "project, created by Brad Evans (University of Leeds), assembles a video collection of lectures and interviews of some of the most influential scholars discussing the many dimensions of violence (social, political, economic, aesthetic, theoretical, empirical, etc.). Spanning disciplinary boundaries, the project seeks to ignite a discourse on violence and thereby move viewers towards peace, or at least ethical resolutions differences.

Gefilte Fish and Couscous

Sunday, Nov. 9
7 pm
Claudia Roden
Location: Mayerson Jewish Community Center 
Sunday, Nov. 9

Fall of the berlin wall 25th anniversary commemoration
Location: National Underground Railroad Freedom Center
Event Details.

Poverty Lecture Series:  Global Health and Poverty Round Table

Sunday, Nov. 17
7 PM
Speaker: Rabbi Rachel Sabath Beit-Halachmi
Title: Lichter Lecture: Women of the Wall: Recent Legal Developments
Sponsors: Jacob and Jennie L. Lichter Lecture Fund, the Jewish Federation of Cincinnati, the Mayerson Jewish Community Center, and the Ohio Humanities Council.

Wednesday, Nov. 13
12:30 PM
Summit: Security, Surveillance, and the Public Good 

Saturday, Nov. 9
9 AM - 5 PM
Conference: Future Cities; Livable Futures
Location: Contemporary Arts Center
Sponsors: Faculty Development Council, McMicken College, DAAP, Sociology, CAC, Taft Research Center, the Architecture Foundation of Cincinnati, Soapbox, Kroger, and the Haile Foundation
Event website: http://www.futurecitieslf.com/

Monday, Nov. 4
7 PM
Speaker: Gary Jacobsohn
Lichter Lecture: Constitutions in Divided Societies: the Case of Israel
Location: College of Law, Room 114
Sponsors: Jacob and Jennie L. Lichter Lecture Fund, the Jewish Federation of Cincinnati, the Ohio Humanities Council, and the College of Law

Monday, Nov. 4
2:45-4:45 PM
Speakers: Carol Cohn & Cynthia Enloe
Lectures: If You Ignore Women, You Can't Be Smart About Militarized Masculinities: A Feminist Warning and If You Ignore Political Economy, You Can't Be Smart About Women and Peacebuilding.
Location: UC’s Kaplan Auditorium (DAAP 5401)
Reception to follow from 4:45-6:00 pm outside the Reed Gallery (DAAP 5th floor).
Sponsors: US Institute of Peace, the UC Departments of Political Science and Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, the Taft Human Rights Studies and Global Studies Research Groups, the University of Dayton Human Rights Program, the UC College of Law’s Center for Race, Gender and Social Justice and the Urban Morgan Institute for Human Rights.

Monday, Nov. 4
11 AM-12:30 PM
Speakers: Carol Cohn & Cynthia Enloe
Workshop: Pedagogy and Policy Challenges: Taking the 'Women, Peace, and Security' Agenda Seriously
Location: Taft Research Center
Sponsors: US Institute of Peace, the UC Departments of Political Science and Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, the Taft Human Rights Studies and Global Studies Research Groups, the University of Dayton Human Rights Program, the UC College of Law’s Center for Race, Gender and Social Justice and the Urban Morgan Institute for Human Rights.

Wednesday, Oct. 23
7 PM
Speaker: David Flatto, Professor of Law, Penn State University Title: The Concept of a Separation of Powers: A Novel Doctrine in Early Jewish Jurisprudence and its Analogs in Modern Western Jurisprudence
Location: Taft Research Center
Sponsors: Taft Research Center, Judaic Studies, Lichter Lecture Fund

Wednesday, Oct. 16
3:30 PM
Speaker: Mae Ngai, author of Impossible Subjects: Illegal Aliens and the Making of Modern America (2004) and The Lucky Ones: One Family and the Extraordinary Invention of Chinese America (2010)
Title: A Nation of Immigrants? History, Politics, and Immigration Reform
Location: Taft Research Center
Sponsors: Taft Research Center, UC History, and the Urban Morgan Institute for Human Rights in the College of Law

Tuesday, Sept. 17
5:30 PM
Speaker: Fadela Amara, former secretary of State for Urban Policies under Sarkozy (rebroadcast from Chicago event in May 2013)
Title: The Burqa Ban in France
Sponsors: Taft Research Center and Alliance Française.

• Evan Torner (German Studies)
• Stephanie Sadre-Orafai (Anthropology)
• Tony Liao (Communications)
• Katherine Castiello Jones (Sociology)
• James Lee (English)
• Nancy Jennings (Communications)
• Todd Herzog (German Studies)

"Algorithms, Simulations, Platforms" (ASP) seeks to understand the media, infrastructure, culture, and emergent systems of our modern digital ecosystems, as well as non-digital appropriations and responses to those ecosystems, through the lens of humanities and social sciences. This approach is offered as a corrective to a dominant narrative that heedlessly champions "technology" without considering its due constituents and effects. By "algorithms," we mean the specific rules and computations used to sort and re-arrange data, from search functions to motioncapture to finance-predictive software. By "simulations," we mean the imitations of processes or systems, created via the combination of data, lived experience, and the interpretation thereof. By "platforms," we mean the combined hardware and software that constrain and afford certain forms of computation and user behavior. The proposed group draws on interdisciplinary fields such as critical algorithm studies, game studies, cultural studies, communication, and media studies to examine algorithms, simulations, and platforms as means of artistic, literary, and social expression. They both instigate -- and reflect upon -- the fraught societal dynamics of the 21st Century, and inhere within them centuries of capitalist and technological assumptions. The goal of the proposed group is an edited series of public media on these topics, much in the model of HASTAC or Culture Digitally, in the form of essays and podcasts published via the University of Cincinnati Press's Open Educational Resources.

Committee:

• Sunnie Rucker-Chang, German Studies
• Gergana Ivanova, German Studies
• Ashley Currier, Women's, Gender, & Sexuality Studies

This Research Group (RG) recognizes the roles of global capitalism, colonialism, nationalism, migration, and other movements in bringing cultures into contact with one another, often by force. Transnational Cultural Studies (TCS) builds on the insights of older fields, such as comparative literature and studies, and overlaps with new fields, such as comparative area studies. This RG emphasizes nimble, transnational comparisons over “global studies” perspectives that gloss over important distinctions between countries and world regions. TCS is poised to carry UC into twenty-first-century research excellence by overcoming disciplinary compartmentalization that keeps faculty and students from talking and learning across fields.

This RG will highlight Taft member departments’ current strengths in international research and attract faculty from anthropology, area studies (African, Asian, European, Latin American, and Middle Eastern studies), gender and sexuality studies, history, language and literary studies, philosophy, political science, and sociology. Topics of interest to TCS members include: language and identity studies; “text, representation, and context”; popular and visual culture; postcolonial, postsocialist, and postcommunist studies; comparative racial, ethnic, gender, sexuality, and religious studies; intercultural communication; and transnational social movements.

• Kate Sorrels (Chair; History)
• Lora Arduser (English)
• Danielle Bessett (Sociology)
• Vanessa Carbonell (Philosophy)
• Jeffrey Jacobson (Anthropology)
• Michelle McGowan (Women's, Gender, & Sexuality Studies; Pediatric Medicine)
• Edward Wallace (Africana Studies)

The long-standing term “medical humanities” has closely aligned itself with some of the Taft Research Center’s membership (literature, creative writing, history, and philosophy), but historically it has done so from within the boundaries of medicine. Health humanities scholarship, on the other hand, promotes interdisciplinary methods and theories that focus on the intersection of the arts and humanities, health, illness, and healthcare in order to understand the health experiences of patients, caregivers, and communities. Therefore, it includes medicine, the humanities, the social sciences, the arts, allied health, and the community at large.
 

1. Build our social media presence through a Facebook page and twitter account.
2. Continue activities that promote dialogue within and beyond the group.
3. Strengthen ties with relevant centers at UC, especially the Center for the Public Engagement with Science (Philosophy) and the fledgling Ethics Center (Office of Research).
4. Apply for more external funding (two teams of group members are currently working on grant applications).
5. Increase communication and efficiency through a Basecamp group (an online tool for organizing and implementing group projects).
6. Create a database of relevant funding opportunities and a network of internal feedback to support each other’s applications. 

• Carolette R. Norwood (Women's, Gender & Sexuality Studies)
• Tia Sherèe Gaynor (Political Science)
• Brandi Blessett (Political Science)
• Cassandra Jones (Africana Studies)

The social justice research group is composed of scholars whose research, teaching, and community activism prioritizes equity and inclusion and protection of our natural environment. We are deliberately invested in identifying and dismantling structural and systemic apparatuses that oppress, restrict, contain, demean, degrade, and deny the dignity of individuals’ humanity. We recognize human diversities across and within socially constructed categories such as “race,” “gender,” “sexuality,” “class,” “ability,” “religion,” “nationality,” “citizenship,” etc. We believe that equity and inclusion is key to social justice and that every human person is entitled to good health and material well-being and that any true justice is fairness driven and will actively seek to protect individuals’ autonomy, right and opportunities for a good quality life. The foundation of a good quality life includes: secure, clean and sustainable housing; access to health services and health care providers; employment with livable wages; an education; the right to live, work, and play in environments free of hazardous toxicants; rightw to bodily autonomy which includes the rights to marry another individual irrespective of gender, race, nationality, etc.; the right to have children or not and the right to live life in the absence of violence (interpersonal, spatial, state, and structural).

Knowledge Justice: Making Science for Change in Disempowered Polluted Communities

Barbara Allen

Professor in the Graduate Program in Science and Technology Studies, in the College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences at Virginia Tech University

Dr. Allen's work has been funded by several grants from the National Science Foundation, as well as the Institute for Advanced Studies of the Mediterranean. Among Allen's numerous awards, she was a Fulbright Research Fellow in 2009, a Fellow-in-Residence, Bogliasco Foundation, in 2008, a Fellow at the National Museum of American History in 1995, and a National Endowment for the Humanities Institute Fellow in 1994. In addition, she received the 2011-2012 Excellence in Administration Award from the College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences, Virginia Tech; and she is the 2000 recipient of the Robert R. Taylor Award by the Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture, recognizing architectural research and teaching that critically locates and examines the contributions of African-Americans.

Barbara Allen is currently working on several research projects that examine the dynamics of citizens, science, regulation, and environmental justice in heavily polluted regions in the U.S. and the EU. The research examines how different national, cultural, and institutional contexts condition the dynamics of citizen response to environmental problems and regulatory change. Additionally, Allen has been leading a Community-Based Participatory Environmental Health (CBPEH) project funded by the French Agency for Food, Environmental and Occupational Health+Safety (ANSES) to develop, conduct, analyze, and disseminate an environmental health study in several towns in a polluted industrial zone.

Taft Research Center humanitiesNOW 2018 Program (PDF)

Tom Conley

Abbott Lawrence Lowell Professor of Visual and Environmental Studies and of Romance Languages and Literatures, Harvard University

Tom Conley studies relations of space and writing in literature, cartography, and cinema. His work moves to and from early modern France to issues in theory and interpretation in visual media. Conley has published over 250 articles and book-chapters, and several books, including Film Hieroglyphs (1991, 2006), The Graphic Unconscious in Early Modern Writing;(1992) ĽInconscient graphique: Essai sur la lettre á la Renaissane (2000), Cartographic Cinema (2007); An Errant Eye: Topography and Poetry in Early Modern France (2011) and Ā fleur de page: Voir et lire le texte de la Renaissance (2014).

He has held visiting appointments at the University of California-Berkeley, UCLA, the Graduate Center of the City University of New York, ĽĖcoles de Charles, ĽĖcoles en Hautes Ėtudes en Sciences Sociales, and other institutions. Awards include fellowships from the American Council for Learned Societies, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Guggenheim Foundation, and the Walter Jackson Bate Fellow at the Radcliffe Institute. In December of 2011 the Universitē Blaise Pascal (Clermont-Ferrand, France) awarded him an honorary doctorate. Since 2000 he and his spouse, Verena Conley, have been co-masters of Kirkland House.

Taft Research Center humanitiesNOW Program 2017 (PDF)

Gregg Lambert

Dean's Professor of Humanities, Syracuse University, Founding Director of the Syracuse University of Humanities Center, and Principal Investigator of the CNY Humanities Corridor

Professor Lambert is the author of thirteen books and critical editions. He is internationally reowned for his general writings on the contemporary Humanities, as well as his numerous scholarly writings on critical theory, philosophy, film, the contemporary university, Baroque and Neo-Baroque cultural history, and especially for his work on the philosophers Gilles Deleuze, Jacques Derrida, Jean-Francois Lyotard, and Jean-Luc Nancy.

Since 2008, Professor Gregg Lambert has served as Principal Investigator and Director of the Central New York Humanities Corridor, a regional collaborative research network between Syracuse University, Cornell University, the University of Rochester, and the NY6 Liberal Arts Consortium. In addition to the CNY Humanities Corridor, he has directed several other major multi-institutional research and interdisciplinary initiatives. In 2013, he was elected as a member of the International Advisory Board of the Consortium of Humanities Centers and Institutes (CHCI).

6676 Taft Research Center HumanitiesNOW program (PDF)

Michael Lynch

Professor and Director of the University of Connecticut Humanities Institute

Michael Lynch is a Professor of Philosophy and has been at the University of Connecticut since 2004. He is the author and editor of seven books including In Praise of Reason: What Rationality Matters for Democracy, Tuturh, Truth as One and Many, and True to Life. Lynch is the recipient of the Medal of Research Excellence from the University of Connecticut's College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, and has held grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Bogliasco Foundation. Lynch, whose work has been translated into multiple languages, is a contributor to the New York Times and has made appearances on NPR's On Point, the Brian Lehrer Show, and Colin McEnroe and many others. He lectures frequently nationally and internationally, and is presently working on The Knowledge Machine: Knowing More and Understanding Less in the Age of Big Data (W.W. Norton).

GraduateConferencePoster (19) (PDF)

On Tyranny: The Rise of Modern Authoritarianism in Europe and America

26 February, 4:30 PM
Taft Research Center

Timonthy Snyder is one of the leading American historians and public intellectuals, and enjoys perhaps greater prominence in Europe, the subject of most of his work. He is the Richard C. Levin Professor of History at Yale University and a permanent fellow at the Institute for Human Sciences in Vienna.

Snyder received his doctorate from the University of Oxford in 1997, where he was a British Marshall Scholar. Before joining the faculty at Yale in 2001, he held fellowships in Paris, Vienna, and Warsaw, and an Academy Scholarship at Harvard. He speaks five and reads ten European languages. Among his publications are six single-authored award-winning books, all of which have been translated: Nationalism, Marxism, and Modern Central Europe: A Biography of Kazimierz Kelles-Krauz (1998, second edition 2017); The Reconstruction of Nations: Poland, Ukraine, Lithuania, Belarus, 1569-1999 (2003); Sketches from a Secret War: A Polish Artist's Mission to Liberate Soviet Ukraine (2005); The Red Prince: The Secret Lives of a Habsburg Archduke (2008); Bloodlands: Europe Between Hitler and Stalin (2010); and Black Earth: The Holocaust as History and Warning (2015). Bloodlands won twelve awards including the Emerson Prize in the Humanities, a Literature Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the Leipzig Award for European Understanding, and the Hannah Arendt Prize in Political Thought. It has been translated into thirty-three languages, was named to twelve book-of-the-year lists, and was a bestseller in six countries. Black Earth: The Holocaust as History and Warning (2015) will appear in some thirty foreign editions. It has been a bestseller in four countries and has received multiple distinctions including the award of the Dutch Auschwitz Committee.

Snyder is also the co-editor of two books: Wall Around the West: State Borders and Immigration Controls in Europe and North America (2001) and Stalin and Europe: Terror, War, Domination (2013). His most recent book is On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century, it appeared in the United States in February 2017 and is available in numerous foreign editions. The Road to Unfreedom: Russia, Europe, America is forthcoming in April 2018. In a very special project, Snyder helped his friend, the distinguished historian and intellectual Tony Judt, to compose a thematic history of political ideas and intellectuals in politics, Thinking the Twentieth Century (2012). Snyder's essays on the Ukrainian revolution were published in Russian and Ukrainian as Ukrainian History, Russian Politics, European Futures (2014). A broader range of essays was published in Czech as The Politics of Life and Death (2015). Snyder sits on the editorial boards of the Journal of Modern European History and East European Politics and Societies. His scholarly articles have appeared in Past and Present, the journal of Cold War Studies, and other journals; he has also written for The New York Review of Books, Foreign Affairs, The Times Literary Supplement, The Nation, and The New Republic as well as for The NewYork Times, The international Herald Tribune, The Wall Street Journal, and other newspapers.

Snyder was the recipient of an inaugural Andrew Carnegie Fellowship in 2015 and received the Havel Foundation prize the same year. He is a 2017 recipient of the Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellowship. He has received state orders from Estonia, Lithuania, and Poland. He is a member of the Committee on Conscience of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, is the faculty advisor for the Fortunoff Collection of Holocaust Testimonies at Yale, and sits on the advisory councils of the Yivo Institute for Jewish Research and other organizations.

2018 Taft Research Symposium (PDF)

Chandra Talpade Mohanty

2 March, 4 PM
Taft Research Center

Dr. Mohanty is a world-renowned expert in Transnational Feminist Theory, Feminist Studies of Colonialism, Imperialism and Race, Anti-Racist Education and Pedagogies of Dissent, and Privatization, and Anti-Capitalist Critique. Her scholarship focuses on the politics of difference and solidarity; the relation of feminist knowledges and scholarship to organizing and social movements, mobilizing a transnational feminist anti-capitalist critique; decolonizing knowledge, and theorizing agency, identity and resistance in the context of feminist transborder solidarity. Her current work examines the politics of neoliberalism in the academy and in social movements.

Dr. Mohanty is the author of dozen of articles, as well as Feminism Without Borders: Decolonizing Theory, Practicing Solidarity (Duke University Press, 2003). She is also the co-editor of Sage Handbook of Identities (Sage Publications, 2010), Feminism and War: Confronting U.S. Imperialism (Zed Press, 2008), Feminist Geneealogies, Colonial Legacies, Democratic Futures (Routledge, 1997), and Third World Women and the Politics of Feminism (Indiana University Press, 1991), and the Series Editor of Gender, Culture and Global Politics, as well as Comparative Feminist Studies. Among her numerous accolades, Dr. Mohanty has received honorary Doctorates from Wooster College (2012) and Lund University Sweden (2008). 

2017 Taft Research Symposium Program (PDF)

Posthuman Feminism

3 March, 4:30 PM
Taft Research Center

A pioneer in European Women's Studies, Dr. Roshi Braidotti is the founding professor of Gender Studies in the Humanities at Utrecht University and the first scientific director of the Netherlands Research School of Women's Studies. Professor Braidotti is an established scholar in the field of Continental philosophy and epistemology, feminist and gender theories and post-structuralist thought. Her work rests at the intersection of social and political theory, cultural politics, gender, feminist theory and ethnicity studies. The core of her interdisciplinary work consists of four interconnected monographs on the constitution of contemporary subjectivity, with special emphasis on the concept of difference within the history of European philosophy and politcal theory.

Posthuman Feminism
The posthuman/inhuman/non-human discursive field is in full expansion. The posthuman turn is triggered by the convergence of anti-humanism on the one hand and anti-anthropocentrism on the other. Both these strands enjoy strong support, but they refer to different genealogies and traditions. Anti-humanism focuses on the critique of the Humanist ideal of 'Man' as the universal representative of the human, while anti-anthropocentrism criticizes species hierarchy and advances ecological justice. The term 'posthuman feminist theory' marks the emergence of a new type of discourse that is not merely a culmination of these two strands of thought, but a qualitative leap in a new and more complex direction. This paper outlines the shifts of perspective that are taking place in the contemporary critical debates and how they differ from the explicit anti-humanism supported by post-structuralist theories since the 1980's. The paper argues that we are currently experiencing an array of different posthumanist feminist perspectives that are neither linear nor sequential.

2016 Taft Research Symposium (PDF)

Bill McKibben

12 March, 4:30 PM
Taft Research Center

Bill McKibben is an author and environmentalist. His 1989 book The End of Nature is regarded as the first book for a general audience about climate change, and has appeared in 24 languages. He is founder of 350.org, the first planet-wide, grassroots climate change movement. The Schumann Distinguished Scholar in Environmental Studies at Middlebury College and a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, he was the 2013 winner of the Gandhi Prize and the Thomas Merton Prize, and holds honorary degrees from 18 colleges and universities; Foreign Policy named him to their inaugural list of the world's 100 most important global thinkers, and the Boston Globe said he was "probably America's most important environmentalist." A former staff writer for the New Yorker, he writes frequently a wide variety of publications around the world, including the New York Review of Books, National Geographic, and Rolling Stone. He lives in the mountains above Lake Champlain with his wife, the writer Sue Halpern.

2015 Taft Research Symposium (PDF)

Sonia Alvarez and Gustavo Esteva Figueroa

7 April, 5:20 PM and 8 April, 12:45 PM
Taft Research Center

Sonia E. Alvarez, Leonard J. Horwitz Professor of Latin American Politics and Studies and Director of the Center for Latin American, Caribbean, and Latino Studies at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst.
Professor Alvarez has written extensively on social movements, feminisms, NGOs, civil society, transnational activism, and democratization, and has taken part in Latina/women of color feminist, social justice, international solidarity, and anti-racist activism since the 1980s. She has also maintained manifold connections with Brazilian, Latin American, and global feminist movements, while theorizing with/about them. She is the author of Engendering Democracy in Brazil: Women's Movements in Transition Politics and co-editor of several texts, including The Making of Social Movements in Latin America: Identity, Strategy, and Democracy (with Arturo Escobar), and the forthcoming Tanslocalities/Translocalidades: Feminist Politics of Translation in the Latin/a America (With Claudia de Lima Costa, Veronica Feliu, Rebecca Hester, Norma Klahn, and Millie Thayer with the assistance of Cruz C. Bueno), from Duke University Press. Her current research, funded by a Fulbright Scholar award, centers on the articulation of race and anti-racist politics among feminist movements in Brazil and the "sidestreaming" of feminist discourses and practices into parallel social movements throughout the Latin American region.

Gustavo Esteva Figueroa
Born in Mexico City, Gustavo Esteva Figueroa is an environmental activist, and one of the best known advocates of the "Post-Development" or rethinking the modern conception of development. He takes issue with typical planning approaches that typically seek to construct a world based upon a perceived image of both the current and future states. He has authored and co-authored numerous books, chapters, and articles, notably Grassroots Post-modernism: Remaking the Soil of Cultures (with Madhu Suri Prakas), Zed Books, 1998, and recently The Future Development: A Radical Manifesto (with Salvatore Babones, and Philipp Babcicky), Policy Press, 2013.

The Future of Development: A Radical Manifesto

Is there a future for development? Can we follow a path endangering both the environment and the social fabric? The alternative is not going back to the stone age but constructing an economically feasible, socially just, and ecologically sensible world for living well.

2014 Taft Research Symposium (PDF)

Tavis Smiley

Economic Inequality and Poverty in America: The Rich and the Rest of Us

4 April, 5:00 PM
Taft Research Center

From his celebrated conversations with world figures to his work to inspire the next generation of leaders, as a broadcaster, author, advocate, and philanthropist, Tavis Smiley continues to be an outstanding voice for change. Currently, Smiley hosts the late-night television talk show The Tavis Smiley Show distributed by Public Radio International (PRI), and he is the co-host of the Smiley & West, also distributed by PRI. Smiley and Dr. Cornel West co-wrote the New York Times best-selling book The Rich and the Rest of Us: A Poverty Manifesto. In this game-changing text, they not only take on the "p" word - poverty - but challenge all Americans to re-examine their assumptions about poverty in America. Smiley is the first American to simultaneously host signature talk shows on both public television and public radio. In addition to his radio and television work, Smiley has written 16 books including the book he edited, Covenant with Black America, which became the first nonfiction book by a Black-owned publisher to reach #1 on the New York Times best-seller list. He is also the presenter and creative force behind AMERICAN I AM: The African American Imprint - an unprecedented traveling museum exhibition celebrating the extraordinary impact of African American contributions to our nation and to the world. In 2009, Time magazine named him to its list of "The World's 100 Most Influential People." This year, 2013, Tavis Smiley celebrates 10 years on PBS.

2013 Taft Research Symposium (PDF)

Charles W. Mills and Carole Pateman 

Contract and Domination: Talking about Race, Gender, and Power

17 May, 4:30 PM
Taft Research Center

Charles W. Mills is John Evans Professor of Moral and Intellectual Philosophy at Northwestern University. He works in the general area of oppositional political theory, and is the author of five books: "The Racial Contract" (1997); "Blackness Visible: Essays on Philosophy and Race" (1998); "From Class to Race: Essays in White Marxism and Black Radicalism" (2003); Contract and Domination (with Carole Pateman) (2007); and "Radical Theory, Caribbean Reality: Race, Class and Social Domination" (2010).

Carole Pateman is Distinguished Professor Emeritus in the Department of Political Science at the University of California, Los Angeles and Honorary Professor in the School of European Studies at Cardiff University (UK). She is Past-President of the International Political Science Association (1991-94), and a Fellow of the American Academy for Arts and Science and the British Academy. Her best-known books are "Participation and Democratic Theory" (1970) and "The Sexual Contract" (1988). She published "Contract and Domination" with Charles Mills in 2007, and "Basic Income Worldwide: Horizons of Reform" (co-editor with Matthew Murray) will appear later this year. Professor Pateman's Presidential Address to the APSA meeting in 2011, "Participatory Demo-cracy Revisited," is available in the current issue of Perspectives on Politics.

2012 Taft Research Symposium (PDF)

Michael Hardt and Raj Patel

The Commons: What It Is, How to Reclaim It: A Dialogue between Michael Hardt and Raj Patel

12 May, 5:00 PM
Taft Research Center

Michael Hardt received his MA and PhD from the University of Washington. His most recent books, co-written with Antonio Negri, are "Commonwealth" (2009), "Multitude: War and Democracy in the Age of Empire" (2004) and "Empire" (2000). With their sweeping insights into the political, legal, economic and social aspects of globalization, these texts are considered major events in political and critical theory. He is also the author of "Gilles Deleuze: An Apprenticeship in Philosophy" (1993), "Labor of Dionysus: A Critique of the State-Form" (co-written with Antonio Negri, 1994), "Radical Thought in Italy: A Potential Politics (Theory out of Bounds)" (co-edited with Paolo Virno, 1996) and "The Jameson Reader" (co-edited with Kathi Weeks, 2000). Based at Duke University, Hardt currently serves as editor of the South Atlantic Quarterly.

Raj Patel is an award-winning writer, activist and academic. He has degrees from the University of Oxford, the London School of Economics and Cornell University and is currently a visiting scholar at UC-Berkeley's Center for African Studies, an honorary research fellow at the School of Development Studies at the University of KwaZulu-Natal and a fellow at the Institute for Food and Development Policy, also known as Food First. In addition to numerous scholarly publications, he regularly writes for the Guardian, and has contributed to the Los Angeles Times, The New York Times, the San Francisco Chronicle, The Mail on Sunday and the Observer. His first book was "Stuffed and Starved: The Hidden Battle for the World Food System" (2008) and his latest, "The Value of Nothing" (2010) is a New York Times bestseller.

2011 Taft Research Symposium Program (PDF)

Li-Young Lee 

14 May, 4:00 PM
Taft Research Center

Li-Young Lee is the author of four critically acclaimed books of poetry including his most recent, "Behind My Eyes" (Norton, 2008). Earlier volumes include "Book of My Nights" (BOA, 2001); "Rose" (BOA, 1986), which won the Delmore Schwartz Memorial Award; "The City in Which I Love You" (BOA, 1991), which earned the 1990 Lamont Poetry Selection; and a memoir entitled "The Winged Seed: A Remembrance" (Simon and Schuster, 1995), which received an American Book Award from the Before Columbus Foundation. Lee's honors include fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Lannan Foundation and the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, as well as grants from the Illinois Arts Council, the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts. In 1988 he received the Writer's Award from the Mrs. Giles Whiting Foundation. He is also featured on Katja Esson's documentary, "Poetry of Resilience."

Born in 1957 of Chinese parents in Jakarta, Indonesia, Lee learned early about loss and exile. His great-grandfather was China's first republican president; his father, a deeply religious Christian, was the physician of Communist leader Mao Tse-Tung. After the establishment of the People's Republic of China in 1949, Lee's parents escaped to Indonesia. In 1959 his father, after spending a year as a political prisoner in President Sukarno's jails, fled Indonesia with his family to escape anti-Chinese sentiment. After a five-year trek through Hong Kong, Macau and Japan, they settled in the United States in 1964.

"What characterizes Lee's poetry is a certain humility... a willingness to let the sublime enter his field of concentration and take over, a devotion to language, a belief in its holiness." -Gerald Stein

2010 TRS (PDF)

• Grad Enrichment 1 (PDF)
• Grad Enrichment 2 (PDF)
• Grad Enrichment 3 (PDF)
• Grad Enrichment 4 (PDF)

• Grad Summer Fellow 1 (PDF)
• Grad Summer Fellow 2 (PDF)
• Grad Summer Fellow 3 (PDF)
• Grad Summer Fellow 4 (PDF)

• Conf. Ex. 1 (PDF)
• Conf. Ex. 2 (PDF)
• Conf. Ex. 3 (PDF)
• Conf. Ex. 4 (PDF)

• Comp. Lect. Ex. 1 (PDF)
• Comp. Lect. Ex. 2 (PDF)
• Comp. Lect. Ex. 3 (PDF)
• Comp. Lect. Ex. 4 (PDF)

• Collections Ex. 1 (PDF)
• Collections Ex. 2 (PDF)
• Collections Ex. 3 (PDF)
• Collections Ex. 4 (PDF)

• RS Ex. 1 (PDF)
• RS Ex. 2 (PDF)
• RS Ex. 3 (PDF)
• RS Ex. 4 (PDF)

Center Fellowship

Interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary projects will be prioritized over an individual, isolated research agenda. The specific research project for the year need not be interdisciplinary in nature, the faculty member must be committed to intellectual exchange beyond his or her own research project and contribute to the intellectual community of the Taft Center.

• CF_ex1 (PDF)
• CF_ex2 (PDF)
• CF_ex3 (PDF)
• CF_ex4 (PDF)
• CF_ex5 (PDF)
• CF_ex6 (PDF)
• CF_ex7 (PDF)
• CF_ex8 (PDF)

• FRF_ex1 (PDF)
• FRF_ex2 (PDF)
• FRF_ex3 (PDF)
• FRF_ex4 (PDF)

• SRF_ex1 (PDF)
• SRF_ex2 (PDF)
• SRF_ex3 (PDF)
• SRF_ex4 (PDF)

Deadline: Departmental decision is due by February 28th, 2020

The Charles Phelps Taft Dissertation Fellowship provides financial support to advanced, outstanding graduate students in support of their doctoral research. Nine full-year fellowships of $17,600 are earmarked for superior graduate students that are relatively close to completion of their Ph.D. Each Taft Ph.D.-granting department is provided one allocated dissertation fellowship, and the recipient is decided by the faculty within the department. A University Graduate Scholarship (UGS) accompanies each fellowship, through the home department, which covers the standard student health insurance award and course fees. 

General Application Procedures

All applications must be submitted to the Graduate Program Director of your department. The procedures below are suggested guidelines for students and departments, but it is up to each department to adopt them entirely, partially or even establish a completely different set of rules for each year’s applications. Taft does not review applications for dissertation fellowships. 

Departments are free to adopt materials requirements they deem appropriate. The following materials list is for reference by Taft Departments and is based upon previous program requirements. 

• Research abstract (125 words)
• Project description (5 pages)
• The applicant's grade record - something that shows your grades for the courses you have taken while at UC.
• A letter of support from the applicant’s dissertation advisor detailing the following:
  • Progress in the dissertation process by the time of the application, according to the scheduled proposed on the applicant’s dissertation prospectus.
  • The applicant's rank among advanced graduate students and the department's applicants, as well as his or her engagement in extra-curricular activities such as organizing events, taking part in committees, volunteering for departmental activities, etc.
  • The applicant’s productivity, in terms of academic publications, during his or her years as a UC student. This part should also reference in-review publications as well as creative writing produced during the same period.
  • Whether or not all course work and qualifying exams have been completed, and the applicant has advanced to candidacy;
  • Expected completion date of doctoral studies;
  • Whether or not the applicant was previously a dissertation fellow;
• Two letters of support from faculty members, detailing the student’s work under their tutelage;

The primary prerequisite for serious consideration of all candidates is proof of significant progress toward the degree in the calendar year prior to the submission of the application. For students who are in the second year of dissertation work, this progress is usually established by the letters of recommendation of the student's advisor and other members of the dissertation committee. Such letters should summarize what has been accomplished and what remains to be accomplished before the dissertation is considered completed. For students who are about to begin a dissertation, significant progress toward the degree is established by completion of preliminary examination and by letters of recommendation. In exceptional circumstances, awards may be made contingent on satisfactory completion of Ph.D. examinations by the end of the second (spring) semester. 

Guidelines for Departmental Selection

Following departmental review and selection, the Graduate Program Director must send to Taft, no later than February 28, a letter detailing:

• The process of selecting the top two or three candidates
• A final ranking of the candidates, along with any information about other fellowships to which any of the candidates have applied (or will apply)
• The selected candidate's M-number, the title of their dissertations and an abstract of their project of no more 250 words.

Candidates who have had or currently have a Taft Dissertation award will not be eligible for another dissertation award unless there are no other qualified candidates within the department, assessed by a two-thirds majority vote of the faculty. In the exceptionally rare case that a candidate is being awarded a Dissertation Fellowship for the second time, the Department must explain this exceptional circumstance and the reasons for it on its report.

Departments should be advised that students who will attain 174 (140 with MA in-hand prior to attending UC) graduate hours during the fellowship year are not eligible for UGS awards and, therefore, cannot be considered for a Taft Dissertation Fellowship. 

It is not necessary to register for credit hours during the summer, in order to receive the stipend. 

Departments may carry-over their allocated award for up to one year if there is no student that meets department and Taft selection criteria for the Dissertation Fellowship, but may not provide more than two allocated awards in a given academic year.

Responsibilities of Taft Dissertation Fellows

• Taft Fellows may not engage in any form of paid employment, including teaching, during the period of their fellowship.
• The Taft Dissertation Fellowship is classified as a Graduate Assistant Scholarship (GAS), offered through the home department, which covers an entire academic year, including the summer. This does not include ITIE (technology) fees, insurance, or an international fee, if applicable.
• Taft Dissertation Fellows are required to attend several meetings throughout the year. This includes meeting as a cohort to discuss respective projects and selecting the attendees for the humanitiesNOW graduate conference.
• Dissertations Fellows must make themselves available for the entirely of the humanitiesNOWgraduate conference in the humanities, as well as the Annual Research Symposium at Taft, which features the work of our Center Fellows.
• Fellows must maintain residency in close proximity to the university, in order to satisfy the above requirements.
• Failure to meet the necessary obligations of the award may result in the termination of this award.

Reporting

Each department must report annually the status of all previous Fellowship recipients that remain in the department. The final reporting for a student should indicate their final degree status and, when known, where they went after leaving. 

Payment

The Taft Dissertation Fellowship includes $17,600.00 in pay and is categorized as a Graduate Assistant Scholarship (GAS), which covers the period from the first day of Fall Semester through the last day of spring semester. The GAS covers the cost of the instruction and general fees for each semester. Fellowship payments are distributed student accounts at the beginning of each semester, processed as a refund at the beginning of the 4th week of classes, assuming no outstanding debts.

Monies processed as fellowship payments are not reported to the IRS. As such, you will not receive any tax form (ie.1099-M) from the university. However, fellowship monies are taxable and recipients of such payments should self-report this as income to the IRS and plan to pay the appropriate taxes. 

This fund's purpose is to promote the recruitment, retention and advancement of excellent graduate students.

Use of Allocated Funds

The funds are made available to departments to strengthen their graduate programs by enhancing their graduate recruitment and program activities overall but especially to support the enhancement of Graduate Assistantships or Fellowships. To this end, departments are given considerable discretion to award these funds to students in a manner that supports the fund's purpose. Taft does not restrict the departmental decision process, and the individual awards do not have to be approved by any Taft committee. Yearly allocations must be expended by end of the fiscal year for which they are allocated*. 

Departments may use up to $2,000 of their allocation for recruiting and advertising their graduate program. 

The following guidelines must be adhered to in awarding an enhancements of Graduate Assistantships or Fellowships:

1. In making a Graduate Enhancement Award to a student, departments may either increase the Graduate Assistantship stipend or supplement stipend funding to meetGraduate School minimums. Departments may also use the funds for graduate fellowships, under which the student does not perform teaching or research duties for the department.
2. When an award is made to enhance a Graduate Assistantship, it must be added to the Graduate Assistantship stipend.
3. When an award is made as a fellowship during the fall or Spring semester, the stipend must be at least as large as the minimum Graduate Assistantship stipend set by the Graduate School, for twenty (20) hours of work per week.
4. It is inappropriate to use Taft awards to make across-the-board increases to all students.
5. A student receiving a Taft award in this manner must receive at least $1,000.

* Per a 2014 – 2015 vote by the Faculty Executive Board, Taft has adopted a special rule for Taft Professors, DARS, and Graduate Enhancement: Rollover will be allowed for into a second year, and by special permission, a third year, provided there is justification for the carryover as well as project start and end dates.

Deadline: November 1st, 2019
Sample Applications

Taft Graduate Enrichment Awards support graduate students registered in a Taft discipline, in research projects that will significantly advance their degree program. Individual or joint applications are accepted. Eligible projects include but are not limited to the following:

• Travel to a library, archive or other source of primary research materials;
• Purchase of software or data sets;
• Payment for technical services such as video-taping, laboratory analysis, etc.;
• Expenses involved in conducting interviews or distributing surveys.

Enrichment Awards do not cover conference participation, as these are supported by the Taft Graduate Fellowships and Taft Graduate Travel Awards. The maximum grant is $2,500 for any 24-month period.

Criteria

Applications will be evaluated against the following criteria:

• The quality or promise of quality of the applicant's work as a scholar or creative writer and teacher;
• The significance of the contribution that the proposed project will make to the applicant's degree program;
• The conception, definition, organization, and description of the proposed project;
• The current state of the research, the schedule to do the research, and the timeliness of the grant to ensuring the completion of the project;
• The likelihood that the applicant will complete the project;
• The manner in which the application fulfills the stated requirement.

Note: Study abroad opportunities are given lower priority than activities with a dedicated research component.

Application Process

Applications may be submitted up to 5 PM on regularly scheduled deadlines; this includes electronic submission through the Taft Research Center website and departmental review. In addition to populating the electronic fields, a single pdf document must be uploaded to the system and should contain the following:

• A complete the cover sheet.
• A narrative of no more than five pages that includes:
  • a description of the project and goal(s), distinguished from any concurrent faculty projects or goals, should they coincide;
  • its role in the applicant's degree program;
  • its current status and expected outcomes;
  • a discussion of the expenses requested and their significance to the completion of the project;
  • specific anticipated impacts on one's intellectual development.
• A detailed budget and schedule, indicating any other funding sources involved in the project.
• A curriculum vitae (CV) or other records summarizing the applicant's graduate career.
• A support letter from the student's advisor, project director, or the graduate program director, uploaded to the electronic gateway by the graduate program director at the time of departmental review (which only the GPD can provide). This letter should comment on the role of the project in the student's degree program, as well as the significance of the project and the student's ability to complete it.

**NOTE: UC instituted changes to the student travel policies on 10/1/2012, which can be found by clicking on the following link: student travel policies. Students are responsible for travel policy compliance. Taft assumes no responsibility for a student's lack of compliance with travel policies, which may result in a refusal by UC Accounts Payable to reimburse travel expenses. Notably, you are required to obtain travel authorization prior to travel. The Student Travel Authorization Form  ( STAF ) can be found by following the "Forms" link under "Applying to Taft" or simply by clicking STAF  here, above, or below. Given the travel policies instituted on 10/1/2012, someone from your department should sign the required travel authorization forms, and maintain copies of these in case of emergency.

For detailed instructions on submitting your application, please click Application Instructions. For instructions on how to create a PDF, please click: How to Create a PDF. Note: the system only allows you to upload a single PDF document.

Signatures & Letters of Support

Once the applicant has submitted their application, an email notifying the graduate program director is automatically generated by the electronic application system. The graduate program director should then enter Researcher's Gateway, upload all supporting documents, and provide departmental review. This review process is distinct from the supporting document, and serves to either forward the application to the committee or remand the application to the applicant for amplification. If a thesis committee has been constituted, the graduate student should notify his/her committee chair regarding the application, and the committee chair should then be in contact with the graduate program director regarding departmental authorization.

Grant Terms

Grants may cover non-local transportation (airfare or automobile, whichever is more economical) and a maximum $50 per day towards food and lodging. Project-specific expenses, such as admission fees, photocopying costs, etc. may also be requested.

You are required to obtain travel authorization prior to travel. The Student Travel Authorization Form  ( STAF ) can be found by following the "Forms" link under "Applying to Taft" or simply by clicking STAF  here, above, or below. Given the travel policies instituted on 10/1/2012, someone from your department should sign the required travel authorization forms, and maintain copies of these in case of emergency. Taft is not responsible for lack of student compliance with travel policies, which may result in a refusal by UC Accounts Payable to reimburse travel expenses.

The total expenses claimed cannot be more than authorized, nor can line items be claimed that were not authorized.

Any transfer between line items on approved budgets must be approved by the Chair of the Taft Student Awards Committee.

Reimbursement Procedures

The following procedures should be followed in order to insure reimbursement of travel and or research expenses:

• These awards are now processed through Catalyst by the business administrators in the home department of the awardee. Students will need to work with the business administrators in award distribution, upon the submission of original receipts. ALL receipts for any expenses pre-paid by the university must be included.
• Be sure to obtain itemized receipts. If you are using an e-ticket for air travel, please request a receipt from the airline which clearly indicates the travel points and dates, and the fare. When in doubt, request a paper ticket
• Travel by personal vehicle is reimbursed at the university rate ($0.58 per mile). Mileage should be calculated by an internet map system, e.g. Mapquest, Bing or Google maps.
• Student Travel Authorization Form must be completed prior to any travel, and must be submitted with distribution request. Business personnel in the student's home department will be able to assist with the submission of receipts and any needed forms.
• The total expenses claimed cannot be more than authorized, nor can line items be claimed that were not authorized.
• Any transfer between line items on approved budgets must be approved by the Chair of the Taft Faculty Executive Board.

Deadline: March 6th, 2020
Sample Applications

Graduate Summer Fellowships provide $3,000 in support for graduate students conducting focused research projects, supervised by a faculty mentor. Grants are expected to culminate in a presentation or journal submission. Taft will cover the cost of posters should students elect to present at the UC Graduate Poster Forum held each Spring.

Applications

Applicants are required to apply for and report available funding from other sources (e.g. home department or the Graduate Student Association) to the Taft Student Awards Committee.

Applications must be completed by 5 PM on regularly scheduled deadlines; this includes electronic submission through the Taft Research Center website and departmental review. 

In addition to populating the electronic fields, a single pdf document must be uploaded to the system and should contain the following: 

• A downloaded & complete the cover sheet.
• A narrative of no more than 1250 words that includes:
  • A detailed statement of purpose explaining importance of the project to their current research or degree work.
  • The role of the proposed project plays in the applicant's degree program;
  • The current status and expected outcomes;
  • Specific anticipated impacts on one's intellectual development.
• A transcript, vita or other records summarizing the applicant's graduate career.
• Students must state whether they are eligible for funding from other sources including but not limited to GSGA, and UC International Programs.

Once the application has been submitted, the graduate program director (GPD) for the selected department will be notified. All support letters should be sent to the GPD, to be uploaded prior to approving the application for committee review.

A support letter from the student's adviser, project director, or the graduate program director, should be uploaded to the electronic gateway by the graduate program director at the time of review (which only the GPD can provide). This letter should comment on the role of the project in the student's degree program, as well as the significance of the project and the student's ability to complete it.

For detailed instructions on submitting your application, please click Application Instructions.

For instructions on how to create a PDF, please click: How to Create a PDF. Note: the system only allows you to upload a single PDF document.

*NOTE: Award announcements are sent by email, from a central source, listed as web.centralATuc.edu.

Deadline

Applications for Taft Graduate Summer Fellowships are accepted during the second semester. Please consult the application deadline page for this year's deadlines. Eligibility is limited to the award cycle prior to the proposed research.

Signatures

Once the applicant has submitted their application, an email notifying the graduate program director is automatically generated by the electronic submissions system. The graduate program director should then provide intradepartmental review and upload any supporting documents at that time. If a thesis committee has been constituted, the graduate student should notify his/her committee chair regarding the travel application, and the committee chair should then be in contact with the graduate program director regarding departmental authorization for travel.

You are required to obtain travel authorization prior to any research travel. The Student Travel Authorization Form (STAF) can be found by following the "Forms" link under "Applying to Taft" or simply by clicking STAF here, above, or below. The Taft Faculty Chair or your departmental advisor may provide the signature of authorizing travel.

Grant Distribution

If awarded a Graduate Summer Fellowship, you must contact your department's business administrator, providing the award letter and request for monies. Your notice should include the relevant information, e.g. when the project will begin and end and project title. The monies will be distributed to your student account and, provided there is no outstanding balance, you will receive a refund check from the University of Cincinnati.

Deadline: Rolling

Grants are available for graduate students traveling domestically or internationally, in order to present their research, whether serving as discussants, presenting a paper or some other creative work at academic conferences or events.

The maximum allowable grant (or combination of grants) is $500 per fiscal year. These funds may be used to cover airfare or mileage at the university rate ($0.585 per mile), whichever is less, a conference registration fee, and per diem, to include lodging.

Applications

Applications must be completed by 5 PM on regularly scheduled deadlines; this includes electronic submission through the Taft Research Center website and departmental review. Weekly deadlines for this program begin in the middle of July and end the second week of June. Funding for travel in the next fiscal year is only available within three months of the close of the current fiscal year, i.e. mid-March. The application process includes electronic submission through the Taft Research Center Web site and a departmental review.  Do note the system only allows applicants to upload a single PDF document prior to departmental approval

In addition to populating the electronic fields, a single pdf document must be uploaded to the system and should contain the following:

A complete cover sheet / template to include:

• Biographical and general project information
• Budget details (and proof of costs, appended at the end of document). Budget should include:
  • Total travel costs, including actual item costs and GSA rates for the area;
  • Amount of GSA-eligible funding available and how this amount defrays the funding requested of Taft
• Abstract / Project Description;
• Statement as to the availability of other travel funds, e.g., GSGA, and their use in relation to this travel, or reason for nonuse.
• Conference announcement and acceptance notice (appended at the end of document).

** Students are required to maintain compliance with the published University policies on student travel (located here: student travel policies). The University travel policies instituted on 10/1/2012 require travel oversight for students, including pre-travel counseling and the maintenance of emergency contact information. Taft is not responsible this counseling or maintenance, or for lack of student compliance with travel policies, which may result in a refusal by the University's Accounts Payable Department to reimburse travel expenses. If you have questions on this matter, you should consult your program director for advice on compliance with these policies. The University requires travel authorization prior to travel. The Student Travel Authorization Form (STAF) can be found here, above or below. The (STAF) should be submitted with the reimbursement, not the application.

For detailed instructions on submitting your application, please click Application Instructions.

For instructions on how to create a PDF, please click: How to Create a PDF. Note: the system only allows you to upload a single PDF document.

**NOTE Award announcements are generally sent by email from within the electronic awards management system at web.centralATuc.edu. Replies to these emails do not reach Taft.

Once the applicant for graduate travel has submitted their application, an email notifying the graduate program director is automatically generated by the electronic submissions system. The graduate program director should then provide intradepartmental review and upload any supporting documents at that time. If a thesis committee has been constituted, the graduate student should notify his/her committee chair regarding the travel application, and the committee chair should then be in contact with the graduate program director regarding departmental authorization for travel.

Reimbursement Procedures

The following procedures should be followed in order to insure reimbursement of travel expenses:

• Per university policies, Grant recipients must submit receipts to departmental admin, for reimbursement through the student account, within 30 calendar days of the conclusion of the trip.
• Travel reimbursements are processed through student accounts and refunds are issued through that account. Once Taft enters information on to the student’s account, the bursar’s office is responsible for issuing a refund, based upon the student’s current account status.
• Registration fees should be separated from any additional Membership/organization fees.
• All receipts for any expenses pre-paid by the university must be included.
• Travel by personal vehicle is reimbursed at the university rate ($0.585 per mile). Mileage should be calculated by an internet map system, e.g. Google maps.
• Any transfer between line items on approved budgets must be approved by the Taft Faculty Chair.

Consistent with the university-wide goal of increasing the amount and quality of undergraduate research and the Taft Research Center’s mission to provide competitive research support, this competitive program supports undergraduate research excellence by offering an award of $2,000 to outstanding undergraduate scholars. This advanced learning experience is designed to create incentives for advanced research opportunities at the undergraduate level and to promote both an undergraduate intellectual community and scholarship in the humanities, broadly conceived. All awardees will be required to participate in the Taft Undergraduate Club on a monthly basis. Senior undergraduates, directed by a faculty mentor, will develop substantial and creative independent research projects, apart from any other coursework, which is intended to culminate in a thesis or expository work presented at the University Undergraduate Research Conference in the spring.

Award Specifics

Upon the successful completion of the terms of the grant, awardees will receive $2,000, paid to the student's account, by the business administrator for the student's Taft-eligible department. If the student’s project includes significant research costs, up to 100% of the award may be used to offset those costs, on a reimbursement basis.

In addition, participating faculty members will receive $500 in remuneration for their time spent mentoring students. Mentor payments will be paid out during the same cycle as the student, i.e. following project completion, as part of their regular payment schedule from the University.  

Students are required to engage in their particular research projects and present their research at the University Undergraduate Research Conference, held in the spring. They will also meet periodically to discuss their projects, intellectual hurdles or other related issues. Students are required to meet no less than once per month with their faculty mentor.

Failure to comply with the above requirement may result in a reduction or loss of the award.

Eligibility

Students in their junior year, majoring in one of the Taft departments are eligible to apply for this award but must be in contact with the undergraduate program director for their discipline and, if different, a faculty mentor. This includes students entering into a 4+1 MA program though it is open to all students entering their senior year. Applicants must have a minimum 3.5 overall grade point average to be considered for this program.

Guidelines for Selection

In case there are more applicants than slots available to grant this award, the Taft Student Awards Committee will consider applicants in two pools. The first will be only for minority applicants, hereby denoted the set-aside pool (diversity fellowships). This set-aside pool of three (3) awards is dedicated to minority applicants. In all cases, if an eligible applicant does not receive an award from the set-aside pool, the applicant will still be considered for an award from the open pool.

Applications will be evaluated for:

• The quality or promise of quality of the applicant's work as a scholar or creative writer.
• The significance of the contribution that the proposed project will make to the applicant's intellectual development in their chosen field of study.
• The conception, definition, organization, and description of the proposed project.
• The current state of the research, the schedule to do the research, and the timeliness of the grant to ensuring the completion of the project.
• The likelihood that the applicant will complete the project.
• The manner in which the application fulfills the stated requirement.
• The letters of support required from the faculty mentor and one other faculty member in their department.
• Grade transcript and evidence of academic achievement.

Terms of the Grant

Grant winners are required to complete all of the following:

1. Apply for a nationally competitive award over the summer, before the start of the fall term. (For more information, see the Office of Nationally Competitive Awards or speak with someone at the Taft Center).
2. Meet with their research cohort at least twice during the academic year, to discuss their projects, intellectual or other related issues, as the core of the Taft Undergraduate Club.
3. Meet at least twice during the year with the Taft Faculty Chair and Center Director (typically as part of their monthly meetings).
4. Meet no less than once per month with their faculty mentor
5. Students are required present their research at the University Undergraduate Research Conference, held in the spring. 

*** Note:Monies processed as fellowship payments are not reported to the IRS, as there is not form for reporting that as income. As such, you will not receive any tax form (ie.1099-M) from the university. However, fellowship monies are taxable and recipients of such payments should self-report this as income to the IRS and plan to pay the appropriate taxes.

The Taft Undergraduate Enrichment Awards enable students majoring in Taft departments to undertake projects that will enhance their learning experience in their major field. Individual or group applications are accepted. Eligible projects include but are not limited to research expenses, travel to a library, archives, museum, or conference, a language immersion program, or an organized field trip. Regardless of the activity, there must be a research component within the proposed project. There is no limit on the number of students who may apply for the enrichment awards, and all awards are made on a competitive basis with none allocated to particular departments. Applications will be evaluated both on the potential value of the enrichment experience and the record of the student(s) applying. The current maximum award for an individual or a project is $2,000.

Undergraduate Enrichment Award Applicants traveling outside the United States, for projects associated with an academic credit bearing experience (i.e., getting a grade), are required to apply for funds from UC International. Those who receive support outside Taft must report such funding to the Taft Faculty Chair upon receipt of award notification.

Eligibility

To be eligible, students must be majoring in one of the Taft departments and must have completed at least 10 upper division credit hours in their major by the end of the current academic year. Seniors are eligible if the project funded will be completed by the first day of classes of the last semester prior to graduation.

Application Process

Applications must be completed by 5 PM on regularly scheduled deadlines; this includes electronic submission through the Taft Research Center website and departmental review.

In addition to populating the electronic fields, a single pdf document must be uploaded to the system and should contain the following:

• Download and completed cover sheet
• Applications should include a description of how the proposed project will advance the student's understanding of his or her major field. This should distinguish the enrichment goal beyond any course credit that might be earned through the project and detail specific anticipated impacts on one's intellectual development. The project description should also include a clear research component, such as collecting information to produce a particular research paper or other scholarly outcome not required by a course. Proposed projects may not merely be a study abroad experience (300-350 words).
• Detailed Budget and justification. 
• Full Transcript or Grade Report.
• Two letters of Recommendation from professors in Taft disciplines who can speak directly to how the project will enrich the student's understanding of his or her major. Letters should be sent to the undergraduate program director in the applicant's department, who will then upload the letters at the time of departmental review.
• A statement of other available sources of funding from UC for the particular type of project. Those who receive support outside Taft must report such funding to the Taft Faculty Chair upon receipt of award notification.

** UC instituted changes to the student travel policies on 10/1/2012, which can be found by clicking on the following link: student travel policies. Students are responsible for travel policy compliance. Taft assumes no responsibility for a student's lack of compliance with travel policies, which may result in a refusal by accounts payable to reimburse travel expenses.

For detailed instructions on submitting your application, please click Application Instructions.

For instructions on how to create a PDF, please click: How to Create a PDF. Note: the system only allows you to upload a single PDF document.

Reimbursement Procedures

You are required to obtain travel authorization prior to travel. The Student Travel Authorization Form (STAF) can be found by clicking (STAF) here, above, or below. The travel policies instituted on 10/1/2012 require travel oversight for students, including pretravel counseling and the maintenance of emergency contact information. Taft is not responsible this counseling or maintenance, or for lack of student compliance with travel policies, which may result in a refusal by UC Accounts Payable to reimburse travel expenses. If you have questions on this matter, you should consult your program director for advice on compliance with these policies. For additional direction, you should visit the policies at student travel policies.

Please be sure to obtain receipts in order to receive payment.  If you are using an e-ticket for air travel, please request a receipt from the airline which clearly indicates the travel points and dates, and the fare. When in doubt, request a paper ticket.

Upon Return: Approval for overnight and International travel must be submitted and approved prior to travel. Awards are processed through Catalyst by the business administrators in the home department of the awardee. Students will need to work with the business administrators in processing receipts for reimbursement. Per university policies, Grant recipients must submit receipts and travel reimbursement within a reasonable period of time following the the conclusion of the trip. Please note that:

• ALL receipts for any expenses pre-paid by the university must be included.
• The total expenses claimed cannot be more than authorized, nor can line items be claimed that were not authorized.
• Any transfer between line items on approved budgets must be approved by the Chair of the Taft Faculty Executive Board.

Taft supports public lectures on a competitive basis, in addition to the Taft Departmental Lectures, Conferences, and Commemorative event funds. The maximum award is $10,000. Applicants should coordinate with their department, taking account of planned events. Priority will be given to highly distinguished speakers who further interdisciplinary and/ or inter-departmental research productivity (e.g., publications and grant writing by faculty and students), and speakers that engage a broad community. Each grant automatically includes up to $180 in lecture support, for the purposes of a dinner or reception in honor of the guest.

Competitive lecture applications must be prospective, submitted at least ten weeks prior to the intended speaking date. Generally, the fall deadline should include applications for lectures occurring in the spring semester and the spring deadline should include applications for lectures occurring in the fall semester of the following year.

Each lecture application must be approved by the department, coordinated with other departmental events, and account for the balance and use of Taft Departmental Lectures funds.

Applicants seeking more than $2,000 must first discuss the application with the Taft Faculty Chair, for the purposes of arranging a TAFTtalk.

• Name of speaker(s), lecture title(s), and date of lecture(s); and
• A short (500 word) biographical description of the proposed speaker, including their work, accomplishments, and status or profile in the field; and
• An outline of the intended activities, e.g. single lecture, seminar presentation(s), roundtable, conference keynote, etc.; and
• Expected audience (size, composition); and
• An account of how the proposed event will contribute to either the humanities, social sciences, and/or inter-disciplinary knowledge and research that benefits Taft faculty and/or students; and
• An itemized budget including honorarium, travel costs, and lodging costs. In the case of honoraria funding, explain the amount requested based on such variables as disciplinary norms, the speaker's level of experience or other factors. Honoraria in excess of $1,000 requires significant justification and generally are not funded. Requests for hosting costs should explicitly address the need for anything beyond standard support.
• Applications must justify why their current Taft Departmental Lecture balance is or is not being used for the proposed event. A department which has not yet otherwise committed its Taft Departmental Lecture funds is expected to commit at least $1,500 towards the speaker. Requests for strong interdisciplinary events do not require departmental commitment, though an account of the interdisciplinary speaker and cross-department collaboration must be provided.
• Competitive lecture grants may be combined with Taft Departmental Lectures and Taft Conference monies. Applications must include an account of such combined uses and the status of departmental lecture monies.

• For each award, up to $180 will be made available to the organizing faculty member to support hosting the visiting speaker.
• Competitive lectures that are not part of a conference program typically should be held in the Taft Center. Receiving an award does not automatically reserve lecture space; grantees must contact Taft to reserve the space.
• Grantee is responsible for working with departmental administrators and understanding the visa status for foreign or non-U.S. citizen speaker, and how this impacts payment, the rules and regulations regarding speaker travel, payments, and events cost reimbursement.
• Taft offers advertising support, provided the timely distribution of needed materials. Departments should publicize lectures in classes, and to faculty, alumni, and the general public.
• All grant funds must be expended exclusively in furtherance of the grant and all expenditures of grant funds must comply with university policies relating to financial transactions, including the Code of Conduct and, as discussed in the Code of Conduct, the ethics laws of the state of Ohio which prohibit certain private financial interests in university matters. University Rule 3361:10-17-03 (D).
• Full disclosure of non-Taft funds received for the proposed project, both inside and outside the university, is required. A Taft grant may not duplicate other funds granted for the same purpose, except when a deficit in the project budget is anticipated even with such non-Taft funds.
• Where significant deviations from the approved application occur, the grantee must notify the Taft Faculty Chair in writing and receive written approval for the changes. Failure to comply with this rule will nullify the grant and require return of the award.
• Grantee should recognize support provided by the Charles Phelps Taft Research Center.
• Publications and creative works generated by faculty organizers, as a result of the funded event(s), should acknowledge the Charles Phelps Taft Research Center.

 

Conference grants provide up to $10,000, on a competitive basis, toward the cost of hosting an academic conference that is timely, interesting, and of scholarly importance to a discipline or a set of disciplines. Grants are not guaranteed for annual conferences.

• Title and short overview including focus, content, format, and expected audience (including the estimated numbers of local, regional, and national attendees; graduate students; general public; academic specialists); and
• Tentative conference schedule, including locations; and
• List of Taft departments involved in organizing, executing, and participating in the conference; and
• List of conference participants, including name, brief description, and role; and
• Detailed budget including:
• Honoraria, travel, and lodging expenses for each participant
• Promotion costs (printing, brochure, ads, postage)
• Other expenses
• Total cost
• Tangible and in-kind (Taft and non-Taft) departmental support
• Other funding sources
• Amount requested of Taft
• List of evaluation committee members (members independent of conference planners)

• All grant funds must be expended exclusively in furtherance of the grant and all expenditures of grant funds must comply with university policies relating to financial transactions, including the Code of Conduct and, as discussed in the Code of Conduct, the ethics laws of the state of Ohio which prohibit certain private financial interests in university matters. University Rule 3361:10-17-03 (D).
• Full disclosure of non-Taft funds received for the proposed project, both inside and outside the university, is required. The grant may not duplicate other funds granted for the same purpose, except when a deficit in the project budget is anticipated even with such non-Taft funds.
• Honoraria may be provided for keynote speakers and other participants but not UC faculty members.
• The conference should recognize support provided by the Charles Phelps Taft Research Center.
• Publications and creative works generated by faculty organizers, as a result the grant, should acknowledge the Charles Phelps Taft Research Center.
• In the case of significant changes to the approved proposal, the Grantee must notify the Chair of the Taft Executive Board in writing and receive written approval for the changes. Failure to comply with this rule will nullify the grant and require return of the award.
• Where significant deviations from the approved application occur, the grantee must notify the Taft Faculty Chair in writing and receive written approval for the changes. Failure to comply with this rule will nullify the grant and require return of the award.
• Within 60 days of the conclusion of the conference, a final conference evaluation should be sent to the Taft Faculty Chair. The report should include:
• Approximate attendee demographics; and
• A description of activities and procedures, strengths and weaknesses; suggestions for improvement; and
• Notes of evaluation compiled from audience, speakers, or a dedicated elevator.

Purpose

The Charles Phelps Taft Research Center sponsors a program of public lectures each year. The intention is that Taft departments invite renowned speakers to give lectures that are not only of interest to specialists, but also are accessible to non-specialists. Each Taft department has a budget allocation of $3,000 for the purpose of inviting as many esteemed speakers as it desires.

For each speaker, there may be $180 available to help defray meals for the speaker, Taft faculty, and guests. The purchase of alcohol must be preauthorized by the appropriate authority (typically the Dean) and a copy of the signed preapproval form must accompany original receipts. Contact the Taft Financial Administrator concerning available funds.

Procedures

Each department may allocate its funds at its own discretion. However, to ensure that lectures sponsored by the Taft Research Center reach the widest possible audience, the following policies should be observed:

• No more than one Taft lecture will occur on the same day, except if part of the same conference.
• No grant will be provided for events scheduled during the humanitiesNOW graduate conference (Feb. 17 - 19) or the Annual Research Symposium (Feb. 29 - Mar. 4).
• Taft lectures are to be held at the Taft Research Center in Edwards I, unless 
  Taft is otherwise booked.
• Advertising will be done by the Taft Research Center. However, departments should publicize lectures in classes, and to faculty, alumni, and the general public.
• Checks for speakers and departmental expense claims should be handled through the Taft secretary.
• Departments must submit their annual department lecture proposals in their annual head's report due August 31st.  Lecture dates are set on a first come, first serve basis.
• You must contact the Taft Research Center to arrange the date and time of the lecture, apart from the application process. Receptions at the Taft Research Center are permissible.

Terms of Grant

• All grant funds must be expended exclusively in furtherance of the grant and all expenditures of grant funds must comply with university policies relating to financial transactions, including the Code of Conduct and, as discussed in the Code of Conduct, the ethics laws of the state of Ohio which prohibit certain private financial interests in university matters. (University Rule 3361:10-17-03(D);  http://www.uc.edu/content/dam/uc/trustees/docs/rules_10/10-17-03.pdf).
• Full disclosure of non-Taft funds received, both inside and outside the university, is required. The Taft grant may not duplicate other funds granted for the same purpose, except when a deficit in the project budget is anticipated even with such non-Taft funds. For example, Taft Travel Grants may supplement funds from non-Taft sources in cases where the necessary and reasonable costs exceed the established Taft limits.
• If there are any changes in plans from the originally approved application, the Taft grant recipient must notify the Chair of the Taft Executive Board in writing and receive written approval for the changes. Failure to comply with this rule will nullify the grant and require return of the award.
• Any event supported by a Taft Competitive Lecture Grant must acknowledge Taft support at event and on all published materials. Material production that invokes the Taft name or makes use of the Taft emblem must be approved by Taft prior to production and dissemination.
• Publications and creative work generated with the help of Taft grants must acknowledge the Charles Phelps Taft Research Center at the University of Cincinnati. Copies of such publications should be sent to the Chair of the Taft Executive Board.
• A travel authorization form (TA)must be signed by the traveler and their department head, prior to travel. Authorization for a department head's travel is provided by the Dean.

Collections purchases allow faculty and departments the opportunity to acquire a specific collection (books, videos, data sets or other library materials), in order to further the research opportunities not otherwise available. Purchases may include (but are not limited to) general reference and research resources such as large digital archives or microfilm collections; bibliographies and catalogs; information on multimedia; rare or out-of-print books; and back issues of serials to which the library currently subscribes, and data sets (either direct holding or through subscription access).

Material purchases (such as books, catalogs, or serials) must be held in a manner that allows the widest possible use. Where possible, materials should be purchased through the University Libraries, to be held in circulating collections. Faculty must coordinate library-held purchases through the collections librarian (discipline bibliographer), and secure a commitment from the library on cost share, as collections grants share purchase costs with the library and are capped at 66% of the total cost. In cases of very expensive collections, the Research Support Committee will entertain proposals that seek multi-year commitment of Taft funds. Such proposals, however, must contain commitments of substantial non-Taft funding and will be the exception, rather than the rule. Library materials typically purchased with general funds by university libraries will not usually be funded. In particular, serial subscriptions will not be funded.

Applications must account for the current Taft Departmental Allocation Research Support balance and commitments. For purchases above $2,000 or where the Taft Departmental Allocation Research Support fund has been exhausted, faculty may apply to the Collections Purchase competitive program without additional departmental commitment. A department which has not yet otherwise committed its current Taft Departmental Allocation Research Support is expected to contribute to the purchase.

• A narrative of no more than 1000 words, which explains the potential uses of the materials for research purposes in the applicant's discipline and related Taft disciplines. Details should be given concerning:
  • The likely use of the material for research by faculty members or students. When appropriate, list other faculty who would benefit specifically and explain the connection between the material and their research, (additionally the proposal may address secondary use for course work by graduate or undergraduate students);
  • How the material would complement existing holdings at UC libraries or in the department;
  • The location of the nearest library containing the requested materials, if applicable;
  • Indicate where the materials will be located and the rationale for that location.
• All applicants requesting material purchases (books, data sets, etc.) must address the current availability of that material. Due diligence in determining whether or not the material is currently available is expected and should be reported. Applicants requesting library purchases should provide documentation that the library does not currently own the material in any format, including Ohio-link or other access; or document that the proposed format will greatly enhance their ability to use the materials; and
• Budget with justification for the cost of the purchase, the cost advantage of ownership, and also specify non-Taft resources that have been committed, if any. Library-held purchases should be supplemented with Library funds. Alternative funding levels or payment plans may also be suggested; and
• The Taft Departmental Allocation Research Support balance and commitments for each sponsoring department must be provided; and
• Applicants must include a letter from a library bibliographer, which speaks to the anticipated use of these materials in research (and teaching) and the value of the material to the collection at the University of Cincinnati; and
• An abbreviated (two-page) curriculum vitae for each faculty researcher supporting the application; and
• Copies of any relevant supporting materials, e.g. descriptive information from a book publisher or a software vendor.

Taft provides departments with research support funds to enable faculty research on small-dollar (below $2,000 per) projects. Where a specific project requires $2,000 or more in financial support, faculty may apply for research support. Where the research support required is less than $2,000, faculty must use department allocated research support (DARS) funds.

The following guidelines should be used in seeking funding for projects:

• Each funding request must be accompanied by a project name and short description;
• DARS funds may only be used to either directly support a faculty research project, exclusive of other funding opportunities, or to improving the research infrastructure of the department. Eligible expenses include but are not limited to the following:
  • Purchase of books, videos or other research materials not held by UC libraries or available through OhioLINK;
  • Purchase of software or data sets;
  • Payment for technical or consulting services such as video-taping, laboratory analysis, etc.;
  • Expenses involved in conducting interviews or distributing surveys;
  • Professional memberships or conference costs, where these support a specific research project;
  • Purchasing a small research collection, not supported by UC libraries or services through UC libraries;
  • Material purchases (books, data sets, software) must be purchased and held in a manner that allows the widest possible use. Whenever possible, such materials should be purchased through the University Libraries, to be held in circulating collections.

Full disclosure of non-Taft funds received, both inside and outside the university, is required. The Taft grant may not duplicate other funds granted for the same purpose, except when a deficit in the project budget is anticipated even with such non-Taft funds.

• Items that support faculty research only obliquely, e.g. computers, are not an eligible expense under DARS.
• Expenses eligible under other Taft programs, irrespective of support limits for these programs, are not eligible expenses under DARS.
• DARS funds may not be used to support Departmental Operating Expenses.
• All grant funds must be expended exclusively in furtherance of the grant and all expenditures of grant funds must comply with university policies relating to financial transactions, including the Code of Conduct and, as discussed in the Code of Conduct, the ethics laws of the state of Ohio which prohibit certain private financial interests in university matters.(University Rule 3361:10-17-03(D); http://www.uc.edu/content/dam/uc/trustees/docs/rules_10/10-17-03.pdf
• Independent student projects are not eligible expenses under DARS, except where these projects directly support a specific faculty research project.
• Each department shall, in a democratic fashion, determine the procedure and distribution of Departmental Allocated Research Support funds.
• Publications and creative work generated with the help of Taft grants should acknowledge the Charles Phelps Research Center. Copies of such publications should be sent to the Chair of the Taft Executive Board.

DARS balances will be sent to each department at the start of the fiscal year. It is incumbent upon the departments and faculty to track their DARS balances and expenditures. Purchases are to be made by Taft faculty and will be reimbursed by Taft, following the submission of the following:

• A project name, a short description of the project, and how this purchase relates to said project;
• Original, itemized receipts and proof of payment
• Documented approval of the expense by the department and/or reimbursement authorization from the appropriate supervising agent (typically the department head);

Failure to meet the above requirements will result in a reimbursement delay as materials are sent back to departments for additional processing.

Department Chairs are responsible for reporting the intended distribution of DARS funding for the forthcoming fiscal year by including this information in the Department Head Annual Report submitted to Taft at the beginning of each year.

In the spring of 2015, the Taft Faculty executive board voted to allow the carryover of DARS funds into a second year, and by special permission a third year. Implementing this policy requires that we observe the following rule, stated on a yearly basis to make it clear:

• Year 1: The department is provided with monies from the DARS program.
• Year 2: The department is provided with monies from the DARS program and the previous year's unexpended DARS monies are rolled over to be used within this fiscal year.
• Year 3: The department is provided with monies from the DARS program, the previous year's unexpended DARS monies are rolled over to be used within this fiscal year, and by special permission Year 1 DARS funds may be carried over.
• Year 4: The department is provided with monies from the DARS program, the previous year's unexpended DARS monies are rolled over to be used within this year, and by special permission Year 2 DARS funds may be carried over, though unexpended DARS funds from Year 1 are reallocated and no longer available to the department.

Taft offers research support to faculty working on individual research projects, with a priority given to those that have or will seek external funding. Applications may include but are not limited to direct research or research collaboration costs and cost-share grants.

• A narrative of explaining the proposed project’s focus, contributions to the applicant's field, methods and sources; and
• An itemize budget, explanation of costs; and
• Reasonably expected outcomes, including publications, fellowships, performances, and/ or grant sought; and
• Abbreviated (two-page) curriculum vitae; and
• Where applicable, the proposal should also include the following:
• Request for proposals from the external funding source;
• The completed grant proposal submitted to the external funding source; award letters from external sources, which clearly indicate what support is being offered, and any contingencies placed on the support;
• A schedule, indicating when proposal(s) will be submitted, when responses are expected, and when the funded activities will take place;
• Distinct from what is contained in the outside grant proposal, please provide a separate budget sheet that clearly indicates how the budget will be apportioned between Taft funds and other funding sources.
• Abbreviated (two-page) curriculum vitae of investigators involved in the project.
• Recent (5 years) external funding history, indicating the purpose of the grant, funding source, amount requested, amount awarded, your status on the grant, and other investigators, duration of the grant, and the outcomes (i.e., papers or books published, conferences attended, etc.).
• An account of the current Taft Departmental Allocation Research Support balance and commitments, from either the applicant or the department head.
• For purchases above $2,000 or where the Taft Departmental Allocation Research Support fund has been exhausted, faculty may apply to Research Support without additional departmental commitment. A department which has not yet otherwise committed its current Taft Departmental Allocation Research Support is expected to contribute to the project.

• Conceptualization, organization, and description of the proposed project.
• The current state of the research, the proposed schedule of research, and the timeliness of the grant in ensuring project completion.
• The likelihood that the applicant will complete the project, if funded, based upon scholarly record and accomplishment following other grants.
• The quality or future promise of the applicant's work as a scholar or creative writer and teacher.
• Evidence of productivity generally, as well as that stemming from previous Taft grants.
• The significance of the contribution that the proposed project will make to thought and knowledge in the field of the project.
• The nature of external grants and the likelihood of external funding.

• Full disclosure of non-Taft funds received for the proposed project, including those from within the university. A Taft grant may not duplicate other funds granted for the same purpose, except when project costs exceed outside awards.
• Where deviations from the approved application occur, the grantee must notify the Taft Faculty Chair in writing and receive written approval for the changes. Failure to comply with this rule will nullify the grant and require return of the award.
• Publications and creative work generated with the help of Taft grants should acknowledge the Charles Phelps Taft Research Center.
• A travel authorization request must be submitted via Concur and approved prior to travel.

• Per university policy, receipts and travel reimbursement request must be submitted via Concur, within 30 calendar days of the conclusion of the trip. Reimbursement for travel will not occur after 30 days except where funding is received only after travel has occurred.
• Taft will not reimburse expenses for alcohol.
• Where deviations from the approved application occur, the grantee must notify the Taft Faculty Chair in writing and receive written approval for the changes. Approval must be submitted with reimbursement request.
• In cases of collaborator travel the grantees departmental business personnel will assist with the submission of expenses.
• Per diem reimbursement is based on the federal rate for meals and incidental expenses (M&IE) and may be claimed without receipts, except for lodging, which requires an itemized receipt and proof of payment.

Taft underwrites faculty, graduate student, and advanced undergraduate development by offering support for a visiting scholar’s participation in a semester-long seminar that enables faculty and students to focus on a particular research agenda, problem, or theme related. Invited scholars should work in areas with demonstrated interdisciplinary appeal.

Seminars should afford significant, sustained interactions between the visiting scholar(s) and UC faculty and students. Proposals may include a single sustained engagement for a visiting scholar or several shorter engagements, with multiple scholars; and may also include (though not exclusively) remote participation. Seminars must not be a mere series of lectures.

Applications must specify the proposed use of the $25,000 award, including honoraria, accommodations, food, and other possible hosting costs.

• Seminar name, proposed date, brief description of the proposed seminar, justification of the seminar as an important intellectual exercise of discovery set in the context of disciplinary and/or interdisciplinary trends, including a statement on the relevance of the seminar to advancement of departmental and/or interdisciplinary goals (e.g., programs, research focus, grant-writing); and
• A list of the committed UC participants and an explanation of the relevance of the seminar for specific seminar participant’s research agendas; and
• An organizational plan of meetings; how the seminar will be conducted; and, how the release money will be apportioned based on college adjunct rates; and
• Anticipated outcomes of the seminar; and
• Syllabus for the seminar; and
• The name, title, and a brief description of each invited facilitator, and a letter of commitment; and
• Abbreviated (two-page) curriculum vitae of each invited facilitator; and
• A letter of support from the applicant’s department head, assessing the merits of the proposal project and the department’s commitment; and
• A budget indicating how the grant is to be used, including honoraria, accommodations, food, and other possible hosting costs.

• Seminar design, length of stay, likely outcomes; and
• The contribution of the proposed seminar to participating faculty and student research and professional development, and the field; and
• The conceptualization and organization or the proposed seminar; and
• The scope of the seminar in terms of participants, impact on disciplinary or interdisciplinary activities in the Taft departments, and interdisciplinary appeal of the visiting scholar; and
• The proposed visiting faculty and their likely contribution to the seminar, UC, and the Cincinnati community.

• Each award category for Research Support has distinct funding caps. Cumulatively, no faculty member may receive more than $100,000 in Research Support awards during a five-year period. If several faculty members submit a joint request, they may apportion the cost of the award among themselves in any manner they choose. If they do not indicate an apportionment, it will be assumed that the cost is to be apportioned equally among all faculty listed on the proposal.
• Faculty organizers are responsible for securing any needed accommodations for the visiting scholar, including food and temporary insurance, for the duration of their stay in Cincinnati.
• Taft Research Seminars are not to be used as a means of creating an adjunct position for the department.
• All grant funds must be expended exclusively in furtherance of the grant and all expenditures of grant funds must comply with university policies relating to financial transactions, including the Code of Conduct and, as discussed in the Code of Conduct, the ethics laws of the state of Ohio which prohibit certain private financial interests in university matters. University Rule 3361:10-17-03 (D).
• The designated convener will be responsible for organizing and running the seminar on a regularly scheduled basis.
• The convener is the principal liaison with the facilitator and is responsible all aspects of the facilitator’s stay in Cincinnati.
• Publications and creative works generated by faculty organizers, as a result of the funded event(s), should acknowledge the Charles Phelps Taft Research Center.
• Should the visiting guest stay with a family member or a UC faculty member, the guest is eligible to receive up to $25 per day, reimbursed to the visitor, provided that a note of explanation is submitted at the time of the initial payment.

Applications

Applications must be submitted in a timely fashion, allowing reviewers to submit support letters prior to the close of the deadline at 5 PM on the posted day. Support letters that arrive after the close of the posted deadline may not be considered by the committee.

• A proposal (1400 word maximum) outlining the research project, including but not limited to the following:
• A brief project narrative and schedule detailing the timeline to completion and publication; and
• Context for understanding the project as a major publishable work that will result in significant contributions to the applicant's field and an explanation of how the proposed project fits within the applicant’s established record of research; and
• Explanation of how the project may be moved forward through the specific experience of serving as a Taft Center Fellow and how the applicant might contribute to a multi-disciplinary intellectual environment; and
• Reasonably expected outcomes, including publications, fellowships, performances, and/ or grant sought.
Abbreviated (two-page) curriculum vitae.
• A letter of support from the applicant's department head assessing the merits of the proposed project and the prospects for completion within the Center Fellowship year. The letter must commit the Department to a full-year research assignment, which releases the faculty member from teaching and administrative/ service duties. Department Heads may support multiple applications.
• A letter from two outside experts in the applicant's field, evaluating the merits of the proposal, the project’s significance and contributions to the field, and prospects for publication/performance upon completion. Once the applicant submits their proposal, a prompt will be sent to both external evaluators and the applicant’s supervisor (typically department head). Following the prompts in the notice email, letters may be uploaded to the application system. Letters of support will be treated confidentially. All letters must be uploaded to the system prior to the 5 PM on the day of the published deadline. Support letters that arrive after the close of the posted deadline may not be considered by the committee.

One goal of the fellowship selection process is to create a community of scholars in residence across the spectrum of Taft academic fields. Proposals will be judged according to the following criteria:

• The committee will prioritize those projects that lead to significant scholarly production over the course of an academic year.
• The quality of the applicant's work as a scholar or creative writer as evidenced by previous publications and research activity.
• The potential contribution as an active Taft Center Fellow to the multi-disciplinary environment of the Center and the Center’s likely impact on the applicant.
• The significance of the contribution that the proposed project will make to thought and knowledge in the field of the project.
• The conceptualization, definition, organization, and description of the proposed project.
• The current state of the research, the schedule to do the research, and the commitment to complete the project as a Center Fellow.
• Evidence of productivity from any Taft grant.

• The Fellowship requires the grantee’s release from regular faculty duties during the year, including department, college, and university administrative service. Grantees are expected to be active Center members and interact regularly with other Taft Fellows to advance their own work and the work of others, which includes a regular presence at the center, attending center-sponsored events, regular interaction with their cohort; and contribution to the intellectual community of the Taft Center.
Grantees agree to attend regularly scheduled seminar luncheons at the Center.
• Grantees agree to use the Taft Center Fellow’s offices at the Taft Research Center as their principal work area. The Center will arrange movement of faculty materials to these offices.
• Other than attending professional meetings and/or brief research trips outlined in the original proposal, time away from the Center should be avoided during the Fellowship year.
• Grantees agree to present on their projects at a time designated by the Taft Research Center Director and Faculty Chair.
• Grantees agree to acknowledge support received from Charles Phelps Taft Research Center Taft in any publication/ performance resulting from the fellowship project. Copies of such publications should be sent to the Taft Faculty Chair.
• Subject to approval of the Faculty Awards Committee, other support may be accepted concurrent with the Fellowship. Full disclosure of non-Taft funds received for the proposed project, both inside and outside the University, is required.
• Grantees agree to subsequently serve on the Center Fellows Committee by request of the Taft Faculty Chair, as their schedule permits.
• Department heads must commit to sustain their current curriculum in the absence of the Center Fellow.
• In compensation for release, the grantee’s department receives up to $25,000 in support, to be used toward sustaining the current curriculum, absent the released faculty member, including teaching (adjunct, GA / TA) salaries, and secondarily, up to 50% of the total award may be used to forward the research mission of the department, in whatever ways maximize the use of Taft funds for departments to best enable them to release the faculty member. At the end of the award period, unexpended funds will not be available for departmental use.
• All grant funds must be expended exclusively in furtherance of the grant and all expenditures of grant funds must comply with university policies relating to financial transactions, including the Code of Conduct and, as discussed in the Code of Conduct, the ethics laws of the state of Ohio which prohibit certain private financial interests in university matters. University Rule 3361:10-17-03 (D).
• Grantees are not eligible to apply again for five academic years.