New Research Opportunities for Undergraduates in the Humanities

By Terry Strathman

January 18, 2001

In an unusual collaboration, the Townsend Center for the Humanities and the Undergraduate Research Apprentice Program (U R A P) have joined efforts to create more opportunities for undergraduates to do humanities research.

When we think about "research," we often think first of test tubes and cyclotrons. And with good reason-an image of white-coated science has come to serve as signifier for "research." But every field of learning has its own tools, its own sites of investigation, and its own questions.

Students in U R A P have opportunities to assist faculty in many disciplines. Those who choose research in the humanities find themselves working in the archives, museums and libraries of the campus. On occasion their research takes them beyond the campus, to national collections and museums, or to archives and archeological sites abroad. Apprentices work closely with humanities faculty to answer complex questions about human meaning and cultural production.

Each year U R A P awards 32 - 40 stipends of $2000 each to the apprentices who assist faculty with research over the summer. This year, thanks to the Townsend Center for the Humanities, there will be also be a small grant for the faculty who mentor apprentices on projects that address the concerns of the humanities.

Although many humanities scholars work collaboratively, the image of the humanities scholar, poring over texts in an isolated study, has some grounding in reality. The new Townsend grant is designed to encourage some scholars with solitary habits to work with undergraduate research apprentices.

To be eligible for summer stipends, students and faculty must participate in the Undergraduate Research Apprentice Program during the academic year. Although most U R A P projects start in the fall, this spring there are 90 U R A P projects with openings for apprentices, including 29 that are new for the Spring term.

Twenty of the open projects are humanities-related. Apprenticeships are available working on: Chinese Cinema (with Professor Chris Berry), evolving representations of the Rain Forest (Professor Candace Slater), the racialized division of space in photography of the Jim Crow era (Professor Elizabeth Abel), the place of the Grimm brothers in German intellectual history (Professor Kenneth Weisinger), the archives of an ancient Greek archeological site (Professor Stephen Miller), the architecture of the Berkeley campus (Professor David Wright), and many others.

The deadline for student applications is January 22, 2001, but there are sometimes extended deadlines for a few projects.

Students who seek more information about the Undergraduate Research Apprentice Program, including a complete list of U R A P projects for Spring 2001, should go to http://research.berkeley.edu/urap/ or call 643-5376.

Faculty who are interested in participating should call 642-3795.