Schomburg-Mellon Humanities Summer Institute
June 16-July 25, 2008
The Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation have created the Mellon-Schomburg Humanities Summer Institute to encourage minority students and others with an interest in African-American and African Diasporan Studies to pursue graduate degrees in the humanities. The program, open to U.S. citizens and Permanent Residents, offers a six-week session for ten rising seniors (juniors in 2008, graduating in 2009). Five will be selected from New York City and five from Historically Black Colleges and Universities across the nation. The Institute, with the help of renowned scholars, will develop and nurture the students’ interest in the appropriate disciplines, and provide them with the requisite basic intellectual challenges and orientations needed to pursue humanities careers and to reach their full potential.
The Institute is designed to encourage students to work toward a product-driven goal while highlighting entry into the fields of humanities—an area where they can make significant contributions and build dynamic careers. In devoting their energies to the preparation of a Web site, for other students as well as the public, the students will be exposed to the ways new knowledge is created and the intellectual excitement that one derives from the life of the mind. They will become actively involved in the process of research and discovery and the challenge of interpreting documents and other sources. Students will be encouraged to develop a critical intellectual focus and should find the interaction with their peers and their instructors both stimulating and rewarding. In addition, since the students will be engaged in the study of a theme from various disciplinary perspectives they will also be exposed to differing methodologies. Undoubtedly, a great deal of cross-fertilization of ideas will occur, as the students learn from one another, share documentary resources they have unearthed, and debate their different disciplinary visions and approaches.
For more info:
NYPL, Schomburg-Mellon Humanities Summer Institute
