The American Studies Association has since 2006 funded Regional Chapter Grants to develop programming, in the form of conferences or other projects, that engages both American Studies practitioners and others interested in the field within a specific region in an original and creative manner.
2019 Winning Grant
New England American Studies Association
Project Title: Annual Conference/Annual Colloquium
Grant Amount: $3,000
NEASA proposes a two-pronged program consisting of professional development through our colloquium and scholarly inquiry and discourse through our annual conference. The colloquium, to be held in fall 2019, will again focus on professionalization concerns for graduate students, junior faculty, and alternative academics. Last year’s emphasis was on themes of community, and this fall we will hold our colloquium at Roxbury Community College on the theme of “Careers in the Humanities.” Our upcoming NEASA conference will be held June 8, 2019, at Fitchburg State University on the subject of representations, both cultural/artistic, historical and social, and political. While we haven’t chosen our site for spring 2020 yet, we will use the intervening period to solicit possible hosts for the conference and a theme that combines scholarly interest with community concerns.
2018 Winning Grants
Hawai’i American Studies Association
Project Title: ‘Settler Colonialism is Not the Destination’: (Re)mapping Hawaiʻi and the (S)pacific Conference
Grant Amount: $3,000
The grant will support speaker honoraria and refreshments for a three-day conference, organized by HASA. The first day will be centered around curated panels; the second will be composed of small group workshops; and the third and final day will be a follow-up on the proceedings of the entire conference. The idea for the conference emerged out of a perceived need for wider, deeper conversations among graduate students around the topics of settler colonialism and Indigeneity in Hawaiʻi. Through the conference, graduate students will have an opportunity to engage in intimate, face-to-face exchange with undergraduate students, faculty, community members, and professors across the University of Hawaiʻi to address the ongoing challenges surrounding the imagining and enactment of an anticolonial Hawaiʻi.
New England American Studies Association
Project Title: NEASA Professional Development Colloquium, Annual Conference, and Liaison Program (NLP)
Grant Amount: $3,000
The grant will support travel scholarships for NEASA members to attend the Fall 2018 colloquium, as well as travel costs and accommodations for a plenary speaker and facility costs for the Spring 2019 conference. In recent years, NEASA has developed two-pronged programming: a colloquium for professional development and an annual conference focused on scholarly inquiry and discourse. The colloquium explores professionalization concerns for graduate students, faculty, and alternative academics, with a focus this year on community building. The conference develops links between regional American Studies programs and local public-sector institutions that share NEASA’s dedication to preserving, understanding, and investigating New England’s histories and cultures, as well as reaching emerging scholars nationally. Additionally, some funds will support awards and the NEASA Liaison Program, a speaker series developed to provide opportunities for members to present on their research and teaching at other institutions. Look for updates to follow on the NEASA chapter website.
Southeastern American Studies Association
Project Title: 2019 Biennial Conference, “Looking Back, Talking Back, Looking Forward”
Grant Amount: $3,000
The grant will go toward funding the upcoming three-day biennial conference, to be hosted at Emory University from March 14-16, 2019. SASA (which recently renamed the association from the Southern to the Southeastern ASA) has organized the call for the conference to be articulated to the national ASA conference, which shares its location in Atlanta, Georgia. “Looking Back, Talking Back, Looking Forward” ask attendees to think about the roles American studies might play or need to play in public discourse: how might American studies as a field be a place for such emergence in a time of emergency? The conference provides opportunities for scholar-teachers at various stages of their careers to engage in scholarly conversations, initiate collaborations, and learn about the changing field of American studies and will be organized around interdisciplinary papers and roundtables. For more information, see the SASA website.