Mellon Fellowship of Scholars in the Humanities
The Mellon Fellowship of Scholars in the Humanities brings outstanding younger scholars (within three years of the PhD) to Stanford on two-year fellowships (with the possibility of a third). Fellows enjoy substantial time to pursue research, teach two courses per year in an affiliated Stanford Department, and participate in an active program of scholarly exchanges with other fellows, Stanford faculty, and outside visitors.
Each fellow is affiliated with a Stanford humanities department, which arranges teaching and office space. This complements the Fellowship’s cross-disciplinary community by promoting fellows’ full engagement in the activities of their home disciplines here at Stanford. Mellon Fellows are also full participants in the intellectual life at the Stanford Humanities Center. Fellows will have the opportunity to be active in the Humanities Center’s programs and workshops.
The Mellon program aims to foster fellows’ careers through close engagement with established scholars, including Stanford faculty associated with the program, internal and visiting fellows at the Stanford Humanities Center. The Fellowship invites major figures in the humanities to present public lectures and participate in small group sessions with the fellows, and the fellows gather throughout the year, to present their research to one another and for professional development workshops devoted to pedagogy, publishing, and mentoring.
Stanford departments have hosted Mellon Fellows for over thirty years, based on a generous grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation in the 1970s. In 2001, the fellowships were brought together into a coherent program under the leadership of Seth Lerer. Lerer developed the program into a genuine community of scholars, fostering intense dialogue across disciplines based primarily on regular and close engagement by the fellows with one another’s work.
The Mellon Fellowship is currently directed by Adrian Daub, Professor of Comparative Literature and German Studies.