Current Fellows
The Center annually welcomes up to forty scholars from all fields of the humanities. Individually, the Fellows pursue their own research and writing. Together, they create a stimulating intellectual community.
The National Humanities Center appointed 32 Fellows for the 2025–26 academic year. Chosen from 588 applicants, they represent humanistic scholarship in African American studies; Africana studies; anthropology; Caribbean studies; history; history of art and architecture; history of the book; studies of languages and literature; medieval studies; music history and musicology; philosophy; religious studies; and theater, dance, and performance studies. Each Fellow will work on an individual research project and will have the opportunity to share ideas in seminars, lectures, and conferences at the Center.
Project disciplines and home institutions are noted for each Fellow.
American Studies, North Carolina Central University
Locating the Self in Black Opera: Edmond Dédé's Morgiane, ou Le Sultan d’Ispahan
Medieval Studies, Montclair State University
Virgil as Sculptor: Premodern Literary Perceptions of the Art of Sculpting
Caribbean Studies, University at Albany
Afterlives of a Voice: History and Memory in Sonic Archives
History, Indiana University Bloomington
Early Native American Filmgoing and Exhibition
African American Studies, Duke University
The Pictorial Life of Harriet Tubman
Religious Studies, University of Missouri
“No Other World Than This”: A History of Atheism in South Asia
African American Studies, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
The Vivian: Black Mothering and Daughtering Amidst Movements
History, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Yorktown: The American Revolution and the Making of the United States
History, University of North Carolina at Greensboro
Erased Archaeology: The 19th/20th Century Settlement of Bosnians at Caesarea, Israel
Africana Studies, Virginia Commonwealth University
Blacklands: The Global Fight for African Freedom
History of Art and Architecture, University of Hawaiʻi at Hilo
The Imperial Song (960–1279) Architectural Culture: Ritual Order, Political Demand, and Religious Concerns
History of Art and Architecture, Wake Forest University
Collating Nature: Illustrated Bencao Books in Ming China
American Studies, University of Virginia
They Don’t Own Us: Harlan County, Kentucky and the Fight for the Future of the American Working Class
Medieval Studies, University of Notre Dame
Binding Ritual: Enclosed Women, Cultural Authority, and Liturgical Books in Late Medieval Germany
History, University of Richmond
Neo-Nazis in Germany and the United States: An Entangled History of Hate, 1945–2000
Philosophy, The Chinese University of Hong Kong
The Abstract Kant: Rethinking the Grounds of Transcendental Philosophy
History, Georgetown University
A Century of Guest Workers: Exploitation and Inequality on American Farms
Theater, Dance, and Performance Studies, University of Notre Dame
Supporting Actors: A Disability History of Theatrical Welfare
History, The University of Hong Kong
A Business History of Modern China, c. 1800 to the Present
History of the Book, Arizona State University
The King’s Press: Typography and Printing in Chosŏn Korea (1392–1910)
Religious Studies, Wittenberg University
Multispecies Perspectives on Jesus in Early Christianity (ca. 50–200 CE)
Medieval Studies, University of Colorado Boulder
Sexual Consent in High Medieval French Literature
Religious Studies, Jewish Theological Seminary of America
Psalms as Ritual, Psalms as Torah: Religious Experience and the Psalter
Religious Studies, University of Florida
From Sanctity to Rights: Animal Ethics in Islam
Music History and Musicology, Stellenbosch University
Playing at/against power: Histories of Trauma and Abuse in South African Music-Pedagogical Spaces
African American Studies, Independent Scholar
Black Embassy: TransAfrica and the Struggle for Foreign Policy Justice
African American Studies, University of Illinois Chicago
The Unreckoned: Black Women, Serial Murder, and the Decline of the All-American City
Anthropology, Princeton University
Faultlines: Geopolitics, Geophysics, and the Sino-American Pacific
History, East Carolina University
Field Ghosts: The Vanishing American Farmworker and the New Slavery
History, Georgetown University
Dinero: A History of Latino Capitalism in America
Religious Studies, Independent Scholar
Sexuality, Spirituality, and the Changing Brain: Exploring the Rise of Religion
History, North Carolina Wesleyan University
The Birth of an Empire: The United States Debates Philippines Annexation 1898–1900
American Studies, Dickinson College
White Care: The Impact of Race on American Infrastructure
Archaeology, Independent Scholar
The Assimilation of Exotic Cultures in Tang China: Cultural Connotations of the Ceramics and Gold-and-Silver Wares with Persian Styled Design
Latin American Studies, Duke University
Counterpoint between Civilism and Militarism in Cuba with Emphasis on the Period called the Revolution in Power
Current Fellows by the Numbers
Disciplines 2025-26
- African American Studies 4
- Africana Studies 1
- American Studies 3
- Anthropology 1
- Archaeology 1
- Caribbean Studies 1
- History 9
- History of Art and Architecture 3
- History of the Book 1
- Languages and Literature 1
- Latin American Studies 1
- Medieval Studies 3
- Music History and Musicology 1
- Philosophy 2
- Religious Studies 5
- Theater, Dance, and Performance Studies 1