American Council of Learned Societies Fellowships (US)

In the 2024-25 competition cycle, the program will award up to 60 fellowships to scholars across all stages of the scholarly career. Approximately half of this year’s awards will support early-career scholars.

ACLS welcomes applications from scholars pursuing research on topics grounded in any time period, world region, or humanistic methodology. ACLS aims to select fellows who are broadly representative of the variety of humanistic scholarship across all fields of study. They also believe that diversity enhances scholarship and seek to recognize academic excellence from all sectors of higher education and beyond. In ACLS’s peer review, funding packages, and engagement with fellows, they aspire to enact their values of equity and inclusion.

The ultimate goal of the project should be a major piece of scholarly work by the applicant, which can take the form of a monograph, articles, publicly engaged humanities project, digital research project, critical edition, or other scholarly resources. The fellowships support projects at any stage of development – beginning, middle, or end. This program does not fund works of fiction (e.g., novels or films), textbooks, straightforward translation (without significant scholarly interpretation and apparatus), or projects that are primarily pedagogical in focus.

Award Information

• The fellowship stipend is set at $60,000 for a 12-month fellowship. Awards of shorter duration will be prorated at $5,000 per month, with the minimum award set at $30,000.
• ACLS provides award supplements of between $3,000-$6,000 for independent scholars, adjunct faculty, and faculty with teaching-intensive roles for costs incurred during the fellowship term, including research support, access to manuscript development workshops, learned society conference attendance, health insurance, or child- or eldercare.
• Tenure: six to twelve months devoted to full-time research and/or writing, to be initiated between July 1, 2025 and July 1, 2026, and to be completed by December 31, 2026. Six months of the fellowship tenure must be consecutive, but any remainder of the fellow’s award term can be taken separately at a later date within the eligible award window.

Eligibility Criteria

• Applicants must:
  • be US citizens, permanent residents, Indigenous individuals residing in the United States through rights associated with the Jay Treaty of 1794, DACA recipients, asylees, refugees, or individuals granted Temporary Protected Status in the United States. In addition, foreign nationals who have been living in the United States or US territories for three or more years before the application deadline are also eligible, provided that they do not establish permanent residence outside the United States during the period of the fellowship.
  • have earned a PhD in the humanities or interpretive social sciences no later than the application deadline. (An established scholar who can demonstrate the equivalent of a PhD in publications and professional experience may also qualify.
  • devote six to twelve months to full-time research and/or writing during the award period, to be initiated between July 1, 2025, and July 1, 2026, and to be completed by December 31, 2026.

For more information, visit ACLS.