UC Berkeley CASE-CRRC Project

CRRC-UC Berkeley Field Project

 Requests for Proposals | Application | Program Description |Work Products from Previous Participants

Request for Proposals

The Institute of Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies (ISEEES) at the University of California, Berkeley (UCB), in collaboration with the Caucasus Research Resource Centers (CRRC), is soliciting proposals from scholars in the social sciences and history from Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia to participate in a two-week workshop at UCB from November 3 to November 16, 2013. The workshop is funded by a generous grant from the Carnegie Corporation of New York.

A total of two scholars (“Carnegie Fellows”) will be brought to UCB for an intensive review of key literature, theoretical approaches, and methods employed in a particular field of scholarship (the “field theme”). Each Carnegie Fellow will work with a paired UCB faculty member and graduate student with knowledge of the Carnegie Fellow’s field theme to develop undergraduate and/or graduate syllabi and teaching materials, explore innovative teaching and research techniques and technologies, and prepare a field survey (with a literature review) for use by other Carnegie Fellows and scholars from the region. The language of the workshop will be English.

Airfare, hotel, and meal expenses will be paid for by ISEEES.  In addition, ISEEES will either pay for or reimburse each Carnegie Fellow for up to $600 in expenses relating to purchasing, copying, or posting teaching materials. ISEEES will provide letters of invitation, but each Carnegie Fellow will be responsible for obtaining and paying for a U.S. visa.

Who is eligible to participate?

  • Citizens of Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia.
  • Scholars who hold the equivalent of a Ph.D.
  • Scholars who have a level of proficiency in written and spoken English that is sufficient to conduct independent research and engage in scholarly debate.

To apply, please submit the following:

  • A completed application form.  A link to the application forms can be found below. The website also has a detailed description of the purpose and design of the workshop. Applicants should be sure to read the Program Description in full to ensure that they are familiar with the design and requirements of the program.
  • A statement of purpose not exceeding three pages indicating the applicant's proposed field theme and the course syllabus or syllabi the applicant expects to develop while at Berkeley.
  • A sample of scholarly research in English not exceeding five pages.
  • A full Curriculum Vitae, including a list of publications.

Applications should be sent to applications@crrccenters.org.  The application deadline was September 13, 2013.

Program Description

The project will bring two “Carnegie Fellows” to Berkeley for a two-week visit to Berkeley for an intensive review of key literature, theoretical approaches, and methods employed in a particular field of scholarship.  Working with two paired UCB faculty members and two paired UCB graduate students from the same academic discipline and with knowledge of the Carnegie Fellow’s field theme, each Carnegie Fellow will produce during their visit, in English, a field reading list, a syllabus for an undergraduate lecture course and/or a syllabus for a graduate seminar, and a field survey, all of which will be posted on the Web for use by other scholars. The visit will take place from November 3 to November 16, 2013. The application deadline is September 13, 2013.  Final decisions on two Carnegie Fellows will be made by September 24, which will leave approximately one month to arrange visas and travel.

Shortly after being selected as a Carnegie Fellow, each Fellow will be informed of the names, backgrounds, and contact information of their assigned Berkeley faculty mentor and graduate student facilitator (GSF). The Carnegie Fellows, working with the GSFs, are asked to prepare a draft course syllabus and a draft summary statement of the field theme and to e-mail the drafts to their respective faculty mentor and GSF one week prior to their arrival at Berkeley. The faculty mentor and GSF will review these materials and will use them to help identify faculty contacts at UCB and neighboring institutions, arrange meetings, and suggest additional readings in preparation for the visit. 

The Carnegie Fellows will arrive at Berkeley on or about Saturday, November 2, and will have Sunday, November 3, to rest and explore the area.  They will also have an opportunity to take a tour of San Francisco, guided by a Berkeley graduate students.  On Monday, November 4, the Carnegie Fellows, faculty mentors, GSFs, and project Principal Investigators (UCB faculty members Victoria Bonnell and Edward Walker) will participate in a daylong workshop.  The workshop will be broken up into four 1½ hour sessions, one for each Carnegie Fellow and corresponding field theme.  The UCB faculty mentors will make presentations reviewing and discussing key works in their disciplines, new theories and lines of research, and his or her intellectual approach to the topic. They will also provide syllabi from courses taught currently or in the past and comment on the draft bibliography/reading lists.  Discussion will follow each presentation.

After the initial workshop, the Carnegie Fellows, with the assistance of the GSFs, will use the Berkeley libraries to gather materials, supplement their reading lists, expand on their course syllabus, and prepare their field reports (see below). They will also be given demonstrations of new technologies for teaching purposes (the effective use of presentation and graphics software in the classroom, course webpages and proctored discussion groups, Internet research, library databases and search engines, the distribution of course materials through the Internet, videoconferencing, etc.) and attend undergraduate lectures and graduate seminars given by the faculty mentor or, with permission, by other UCB faculty.  The faculty mentor will meet periodically with the Carnegie Fellow to discuss progress and make additional suggestions as to reading materials.  In addition, the Carnegie Fellows will meet with other faculty at Berkeley, Stanford, or elsewhere in the Bay Area when practicable. The GSFs will also organize a trip to Stanford to review the libraries there (notably the Hoover Library) and meet with Stanford scholars. During the entirety of their stay, the Carnegie Fellows will be assisted by the GSFs in use of the library, gathering of materials, appointments, class attendance, library access, transportation to Stanford or San Francisco, and preparation of the reading lists, syllabi, and field reports. 

A second workshop will be convened on the afternoon of Friday, November 15, with the entire project team.  Each Carnegie Fellow will present a draft field report (maximum ten pages) at the workshop along with their revised readings lists and syllabi. The field reports will consist of a literature review, an analysis of major contending theoretical approaches in the field, and a description of the main goals/topics that the visiting scholar would cover in an undergraduate lecture class and a graduate seminar on the field theme. 

After the visit, ISEEES will place the project work products (reading list, course syllabus, and field report) on a special website for dissemination purposes. 

See Work Products from previous participants