Opportunities: Grants and Postdoc Fellowship

Thanks to generous funding from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the University of Houston’s Recovering the US Hispanic Literary Heritage is offering two opportunities: 7 Grants-in-aid and 1 Postdoctoral Fellowship in Digital Humanities.

Grants-in-Aid

The Mellon-funded Grants-in-Aid program is designed to provide a stipend to scholars for research and development of digital scholarship in the form of a digital publication and/or a digital project. The grant covers any expense connected with research that will advance a project to the next stage or to a successful conclusion.

Scholars at different stages of their careers (Academics, librarians, advanced graduate students, independent scholars, etc.) are encouraged to apply for a stipend of up to $7,500 for investigative work. Grantees are expected to budget for a 2-day trip to Houston for in-person training at Recovery. We welcome applications in one of the following areas:

• Identification, location and recovery of any wide variety of historical documents and/or literary genres, including conventional literary prose and poetry, and such forms as letters, diaries, memoirs, testimonials, periodicals, historical records and written expressions of oral traditions, folklore and popular culture. Any documents that could prove relevant to the goals of the program will also be considered. The emphasis is on works by Mexican/Chicano, Puerto Rican, Cuban, Spanish, Central and South American and other Latina/o residents of what has become the United States, from the Colonial period to 1980.
• We especially encourage projects highlighting US Latina voices.
• Bibliographic compilations, indexing projects pertaining to any of the above. Compilation of reference works, e.g. bibliographic dictionaries, thematic datasets, linguistic corpus, etc.
• Study of recovered primary source(s) for potential digital publication, including: text analysis, thematic dataset creation, visualization, etc.

To apply, please submit a letter of interest, project description (2-3 pages), proposed budget (include 2-day visit to Houston), CV and 2 letters of recommendation via email to recovery@uh.edu by December 20, 2019.

Read more about the Grants-in-Aid program on our website by clicking here.

Postdoctoral Fellowship in US Latino Digital Humanities

The application period is now open for a two-year Mellon-funded postdoctoral fellowship in US Latino Digital Humanities (USLDH), a division of Recovering the US Hispanic Literary Heritage program (Recovery) at the University of Houston. The program is looking for a recent (less than 5 years) Ph.D. graduate with background expertise in US Latino Studies. The postdoctoral fellow will help re-vision new strategies for data hosted at Recovery in support of teaching, research and community engagement and help to develop initiatives that will enhance collections and scholarship in the field. USLDH will provide the selected candidate with the necessary training in digital tools, metadata and digitization standards, project and content management systems and platforms. The fellow will be expected to create and publish a significant DH project using Recovery’s archives, assist with instruction, support projects and scholars, serve as a mentor for Research Fellows, lead workshops and collaborate in the creation and implementation of toolkits and other pedagogical tools. The postdoctoral fellow will give one university-wide presentation per year at the University of Houston and will have opportunities to teach courses or be invited as a lecturer at partner departments.

Apply online through the UH Job Portal. View full job posting and apply online at by clicking here.

Deadline: December 20, 2019.

U.S. Latino Digital Humanities Program to Launch at UH with Mellon Foundation Grant

A $750,000 grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation has been awarded to the University of Houston to establish a first-of-its-kind U.S. Latino Digital Humanities Program in the College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences.

Read the complete news release here: U.S. Latino Digital Humanities Program to Launch at UH with Mellon Foundation Grant

Recovering the US Hispanic Literary Heritage (Recovery) has digitized hundreds of thousands of documents once at risk of being lost forever — from books and newspapers to manuscripts and personal papers — and made them available for international distribution.

Museum Survey

Over the course of the twentieth century, commensurate with the growth of the Latino population, many local libraries, historical societies, small museums and collections within colleges and universities in the Southwest have become repositories of Hispanic/Latino materials. However, these valuable collections are not well documented and, in some cases, there is risk of damage to the collections. This is largely due to the lack of adequate resources and training at these institutions, both large and small, such that these materials are often held in below standard conditions and are unknown to the scholarly community potentially interested in them.

In 2017-2018, Recovering the US Hispanic Literary Heritage conducted a survey of small historical societies, libraries and museums in the Southwest that might hold Hispanic archival materials and to assess how they were preserved and made accessible. The survey results were published on Recovery’s website to serve as a guide to Hispanic materials at small institutions.

The final phase of the project involved inviting personnel from these small institutions to a meeting to offer us feedback and other projects that could plan out a larger, second project and to offer basic training to the personnel at these collections, to help stabilize the collections and make them accessible.

In summary 358 surveys were distributed. Of these, 59 were completed and returned. This effort was followed up with phone and email contacts to 36 institutions. Of the final list of 36 organizations reporting fully, we invited 18 to come to Houston for a full-day conference; of these 8 attended and participated in the conference. The final “Guide” published on Recovery’s website includes the full report of holdings of these institutions, the types of institutions and their needs; in these, there was a considerable amount of Hispanic archival materials identified, so as to justify the need for this project.

On Friday April 27, 2018, we brought in the historical society directors to the University of Houston to give us feedback, receive some training and plan the next steps.

Nicolás Kanellos, Ph. D.
Brown Foundation Professor of Hispanic Studies
Director, Recovering the US Hispanic Literary Heritage

To view the digital project, please visit: Survey of Small Historical Societies, Libraries and Museums for Hispanic Materials and Their Management

Mellon Grant to Fund Immersive Pedagogy Symposium on Humanities Teaching and Learning with 3D, Augmented and Virtual Reality

Dr. Lorena Gauthereau, a Postdoctoral Fellow at Recovering the US Hispanic Literary Heritage has received a grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and the Council on Library and Information Resources (CLIR) to fund “Immersive Pedagogy: A Symposium on Humanities Teaching and Learning with 3D, Augmented and Virtual Reality.” This symposium will bring together a select group of specialists to design pedagogical material that addresses critical and practical needs in higher education in the humanities. The project team will prioritize incubating projects focused on Latina/o, Latin American, and Caribbean Studies, but will also consider how 3D/XR technologies and data curation can intersect with methodologies deriving from studies of cultural heritage, minority archives, race and ethnicity, women of color feminist theory, community outreach, public humanities, and accessibility. Pedagogical material produced by the symposium participants will be made freely available to the public.

Dr. Gauthereau will serve as the PI on the grant and will work with colleagues from across the country, including Dr. Eric Kaltman (Carnegie Mellon University), Dr. Jessica Linker (Bryn Mawr College), Dr. Emma Slayton (Carnegie Mellon University), Neil Weijer (Johns Hopkins University), Dr. Alex Wermer-Colan (Temple University), and Dr. Chris Young (University of Toronto). “Immersive Pedagogy” is scheduled to take place in summer 2019 at Carnegie Mellon University.

The Council on Library and Information Resources is an independent, nonprofit organization that forges strategies to enhance research, teaching, and learning environments in collaboration with libraries, cultural institutions, and communities of higher learning.

The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation endeavors to strengthen, promote, and, where necessary, defend the contributions of the humanities and the arts to human flourishing and to the well-being of diverse and democratic societies. To this end, the Foundation supports exemplary institutions of higher education and culture as they renew and provide access to an invaluable heritage of ambitious, path-breaking work. The Council on Library and Information Resources is an independent, nonprofit organization that forges strategies to enhance research, teaching, and learning environments in collaboration with libraries, cultural institutions, and communities of higher learning.

CLIR-Mellon grant

Hello and welcome to the Recovery Project’s new blog! My name is Lorena Gauthereau and I am happy to be joining the team as the University of Houston’s first CLIR-Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow. The Council on Library and Information Research (CLIR) offers several postdoctoral fellowships, including one on Data Curation for Latin American and Caribbean Studies, which is funded through the Andrew W. Mellon foundation.

As the Recovery’s postdoctoral fellow, I will be playing a role in the development of their Digital Humanities Center for Latina/o Studies. I will implement services in data curation to create enhanced digital publications of historical and contemporary materials relevant to US Latina/o Studies. I will also be assisting in new US Latina/o Studies digital projects and presenting workshops for the UH community on digital tools. Lastly, I’ll be keeping the Recovery community updated on news, events, digital projects, and more via social media. So, please make sure to follow us!

My own scholarly research draws upon archival materials collected and preserved by the Recovery Project and therefore, I am very excited to be an active participant in the archive’s next steps!

Check back for more blog posts by other Recovery scholars, including our graduate student Research Assistants.

CLIR offers postdoctoral fellowships each year for institutions nationwide, and the application period just opened this month (September). The deadline is at the end of December, so if you are interested or know someone who is interested, make sure to click on the links below!

• For more information on the CLIR-Mellon postdoctoral fellowship for Latin American and Caribbean Studies (for both potential host institutions and applicants), visit CLIR’s website or click here.
• For general information on all of CLIR’s postdoctoral fellowships, visit CLIR’s website or click here.
• For a list of all of CLIR’s current and past postdoctoral fellows, visit CLIR’s website or click here.

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Lorena Gauthereau is a CLIR Postdoctoral Fellow at Recovering the US Hispanic Literary Heritage at the University of Houston. Find her online at https://lorenagauthereau.wordpress.com.

Recovery and Digital Humanities

Welcome to Recovering the US Hispanic Literary Heritage’s new blog page!

The Recovering the US Hispanic Literary Heritage (aka “Recovery”) has recently been awarded  grants from the Council on Library and Information Resources (CLIR) and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. These grants will fund the Recovery’s recent initiative to create the first digital humanities program to focus on US Latina/o Studies.

Things to look for on the blog as Recovery moves forward include: bilingual posts on archival material, digital exhibitions of selected collections, digital humanities projects, collaborations across disciplines and institutions, digital humanities workshops, and more! Make sure to follow us on Twitter at @APPRecovery and like our page on Facebook.

Support Recovering the US Hispanic Literary Heritage! Become a member. Be a donor. Make a difference. You can sign up for Membership by clicking  here.

Membership benefits include:

• Five electronic books Recovery books
• Latest Recovery publications
• 20% discount on Arte Público Press books
• Conference and special events discounts