Congratulations to the nine MLA members who are among the winners of National Endowment for the Humanities grants announced in August 2019. Their projects include a scholarly edition of Charles W. Chesnutt’s stories; a five-day institute for using digital methods to research digital culture; and a symposium on James Baldwin and Beauford Delaney.
Scholarly Editions and Translations
Stephanie Browner (project codirector), New School
Project title: The Complete Short Stories of American Author Charles W. Chesnutt (1858–1932)
Project description: Preparation of a scholarly edition (in printed volumes) of the short stories of the American writer Charles W. Chesnutt (1858–1932).
Deborah Gussman (project codirector), California State University, Dominguez Hills
Project title: The Letters of American Novelist Catharine Maria Sedgwick (1789–1867): An Online Edition
Project description: Preparation of a digital edition of the complete letters of the early American writer Catherine Maria Sedgwick (1789–1867).
Institutes for Advanced Topics in the Digital Humanities
Lisa Rhody, CUNY Research Foundation, Graduate School and University Center
Project title: Digital Humanities Research Institutes: Further Expanding Communities of Practice
Project description: A ten-day residential institute and follow-up activities for fifteen participants to develop core humanities computational research and project development skills, hosted at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York.
Anastasia Salter, University of Central Florida, Orlando
Project title: Understanding Digital Culture: Humanist Lenses for Internet Research
Project description: A five-day institute for twenty-five participants, organized by and hosted at the University of Central Florida, for using digital methods to research digital culture.
Collaborative Research
Naomi Brenner (codirector), University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
Project title: Below the Line: The Feuilleton, the Public Sphere, and Modern Jewish Cultures
Project description: Two international conferences, a Web site, and digital resources on Jewish culture and the feuilleton, a newspaper insert popular throughout Europe from the nineteenth to the early twentieth centuries.
Maya Vinokour, New York University
Project title: The Post-Soviet Public Sphere: Multimedia Sourcebook of the 1990s
Project description: Preparation of a digital collection of bilingual scholarly essays and an open access Web site with 500 Russian-language multimedia artifacts created just before and after the collapse of the Soviet Union, between 1986 and 2000.
Public Scholar Program
Elizabeth Samet, United States Military Academy
Project title: The Nine Lives of Alexander the Great
Project description: Research and writing leading to publication of a book on Alexander the Great (356–323 BCE) as he has been interpreted in history and literature from antiquity to the present.
Collaborative Research
Amy Elias, University of Tennessee, Knoxville
Project title: In a Speculative Light: The Arts of Writer James Baldwin (1924–1987) and Painter Beauford Delaney (1901–1979)
Project description: A symposium and collection of essays on the American author James Baldwin (1924–1987) and the American visual artist Beauford Delaney (1901–1979).
Institutes for School Teachers
Sean Connors, University of Arkansas, Fayetteville
Project title: Remaking Monsters and Heroines: Adapting Classic Literature for Contemporary Audiences
Project description: A two-week institute for thirty K–12 educators on Frankenstein, Cinderella, and adaptations of these classic texts.