University of Chicago Library Special Collections Research Fellowships

The University of Chicago Library awards a small number of short-term research fellowships each year to visiting
researchers who live more than 100 miles from Chicago and whose project requires on-site consultation of materials
in the Special Collections Research Center. Support for beginning scholars is a priority of the program.
Information is now available on applications for fellowships in 2009-2010.

2008-2009 University of Chicago Library Special Collections
Research Fellowship Recipients

Matthias A. Deuschle, Theologische Fakultät Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, for "Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg and the Religious Conservatism in Nineteenth-Century Prussia." The personal library of Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg (1802-1869) was purchased by the old University of Chicago in 1869. Dr. Deuschle will do a critical assessment of the collection and examine individual books for annotations and marginalia that provide insights into Hengstenberg's thought.

Nicole Hesberg, University of Florida, for "Gender and American Indian Urbanization in Chicago and Cleveland, 1946-1970." Ms. Hesberg's dissertation examines how American Indian families, communities, and identities were created during the post-World War II shift from rural to urban areas, using the lens of gender and focusing on two major Midwestern cities, Chicago and Cleveland. She will consult the papers of University of Chicago anthropologists Sol Tax and Fred Eggan and other related collections for her project.

Meradith T. McMunn, Professor of English and Medieval Studies, Rhode Island College, Providence, Rhode Island, for "Reconstructing a Rose: The Codicology and Early Ownership History of University of Chicago Library MSS 1380 and 393." Professor McMunn will examine the recently-acquired 14th-century manuscript of Le Roman de la Rose and Le Jeu des échecs moralisé, another 14th-century manuscript in the Library's collection, with which it was previously bound. The complete descriptions will form part of Professor McMunn's study of all the extant illustrated manuscripts of Le Roman de la Rose, which she is preparing for publication.

Nadine Rinck, Johann Wolfgang-Goethe-Universität, Frankfurt, Germany, for "Max Rheinstein: His Life and Work." Ms. Rinck is a law student writing a doctoral thesis on Rheinstein (1899-1977), who came to the United States in 1933 and was a professor of law at the University of Chicago, 1935-1968. His generation of legal scholars was unique in achieving expertise in both the Continental-European legal system and the Anglo-American Common Law system. Ms. Rinck's project draws on the Rheinstein papers for documentation of his biography and his influence in the fields of comparative law, especially the conflict of laws; the sociology of law, and family law.

Previous Special Collections Fellowship Recipients

2007-2008

David C. Brighouse, Ph.D. candidate in African-American Studies and History at Harvard University, for "Investigating the Color Line: The Social Science Community and Talented Tenth Scholars in Chicago (ca. 1930s-1950s)." This social and intellectual history of the relationship between social science, African-American scholars, and civil rights in Chicago in this period draws on the papers of Ernest Burgess, W. Allison Davis, Louis Wirth, Robert Park, and others.

Edward J.K. Gitre, Ph.D. candidate, Rutgers University, for "America Adjusted: A cultural History of Boredom, ca. 1930-1980." Investigating the University of Chicago's highly influential role in the development of social psychology, this project examines the papers of Ernest Burgess, Everett Hughes, Edward Levi and others; and the Department of Sociology records.

Philip Slavin, Ph.D. candidate, Centre for Medieval Studies, University of Toronto, for studies related to his dissertation on food provisioning of Norwich Cathedral Priory. For research on the agrarian history of East Anglia in the late middle ages, this project includes consulting and tabulating 150 rolls from the Sir Nicholas Bacon Collection of English Court and Manorial Documents.

2006-2007

Katja Naumann, University of Leipzig, for "The Expansion of Historical Space: The Study of Civilizations in U. S. American Academia," a comparative study of academic programs at the University of Chicago, Harvard University, and Columbia University from 1917 to 1968.

Jonathan Sachs, Ph.D. in English, University of Chicago, for "Romantic Antiquity: Rome in the Romantic Imagination, 1789-1832," a book project drawing on 18th-century rare books and popular Roman histories published in the period.

Tasha Vorderstrasse, Ph.D. in Near Eastern Archaeology, University of Chicago, for a study of the interaction between archaeology, art history, and texts; utilizing early manuscripts in Special Collections, this project extends previous work on the pottery and material culture of northwestern Iran, Georgia, and Armenia.