British Academy’s Global Professorships 2024 (United Kingdom)

The Academy views the Global Professorships as an opportunity for established researchers to undertake high-risk, curiosity-driven research in the humanities and social sciences in a UK research institution. The Global Professorships are awards for individuals in an institutional setting. Applications must be for new, coherent and cutting-edge projects. The Global Professorships are expected to add significant value to the UK host institutions and vice versa, and thus the projects must be significant, leading to novel and innovative collaborations.

With the Global Professorships, the Academy is looking to support academics that are proposing ambitious, beyond the state-of-the-art applications that break new ground. The Academy views the Global Professorships as an opportunity to apply to undertake high-risk, curiosity-driven research in the humanities and social sciences that enables the award-holders and their UK host institutions to achieve a step change in their respective research programmes.

The Academy wishes to encourage applications from historically and/or structurally disadvantaged groups and female researchers. Applicants should be intending to work in any aspect of the humanities or the social sciences. Outputs involving creative practice (e.g. musical composition and performance, visual practice, creative writing and film making) are welcome but will be considered to fall within the British Academy’s remit only when they form part of an integrated project of critical or historical significance.

Aims

• Fund high-quality original research – provide long-term funding to enable established researchers to focus on their research vision.
• Attract established international researchers to be based in the UK – Enable internationally-based researchers to undertake cutting edge research in the UK.
• Contribute to advancing the research goals and strategies of the UK host institution – The projects are expected to be complete in themselves, with clearly demonstrable outcomes of value both to the career development of the individual and the strategy of their host UK institution.

Funding Information

• The Academy will provide up to £900,000 per award.
• Duration: Awards are expected to run for four years each from a starting date to be agreed with the British Academy. The starting date must not be before 26 March 2025 – 30 September 2025.

Eligible Funding

• More specifically, funds may be sought to cover the following elements, with indicative figures (these are not fixed upper limits and are intended as a guideline only – flexibility, within reason, will be allowed):
  • Directly incurred salary costs of the award-holder (e.g. £100k p.a.) – the salary is to be negotiated between the applicant and the UK host institution. The Academy will be monitoring the proposed salaries from an equality, diversity and inclusion perspective;
  • Research expenses, including travel, subsistence, accommodation, consumables, training, conferences, dissemination, and one-off relocation and visa expenses (e.g. £10k p.a);
  • Research assistance, directly supporting the goals of the Global Professorship (e.g. additional member of staff in the relevant department/team) (e.g. £50k p.a.) – this will be supported where a reasonable case is made in line with the type of work that is required to be undertaken;
  • Estates and indirect costs of the UK host institution in administering the award (e.g. up to £20k p.a. for estates and up to £45k p.a. for indirect costs). Please note that the Academy and its peer reviewers will assess applications on value for money as outlined in the assessment criteria. Please ensure that the budget is not costed at 80% FEC as this programme is not offered using Full Economic Costing. In addition, any application not considered to have been costed within reason and/or value for money will not be offered an award.
• Bids for the cost of childcare will be considered as part of the allowable research expenses. If a claim for childcare is included, please supply sufficient justification for the case to be assessed.
• Consumables include the purchase of specialist software (not readily available at the UK host organisation), datasets, photocopies, microfilms, etc., and any other minor items that will be used up during the course of the award. Applicants may apply for short-term consultancy or salary costs for expert staff, or short periods of research assistance.
• The Academy expects award-holders to minimise their travel and carbon footprint using alternatives where possible (for example video conferencing), and choose travel that has a lower carbon impact, where practical.

Eligibility Criteria

• Applicants must meet the following eligibility criteria:
  • Grants are available to mid-career and senior researchers in any discipline within the humanities and social sciences (recognised in their field or with exceptional promise) who are currently employed outside the United Kingdom, on a permanent contract (which may be part-time or full-time) or, if temporary, would normally be a contract that will not end during the course of the grant. Any exceptions must be expressly agreed with the Academy prior to the application being submitted in order for such an application to be considered eligible.
  • Applicants must hold a doctoral degree (or have equivalent research experience).
  • PIs may not hold more than one British Academy award of a comparable nature at any one time.
  • An individual cannot be the PI on more than one bid under this Programme, including through different host institutions.
  • Applicants must be available to take up an unpaid leave of absence, a long-term secondment or employment at an eligible UK institution. If this is unclear from an applicant’s national setting, then the Academy welcomes communication with applicants prior to applications being submitted. Eligible institutions include but are not limited to the British International Research Institutes.
  • Awards are only available to individuals, to be held in an institutional context. Co-applicants are not permitted.
  • Awards will not be made retrospectively: this means that the work for which support is requested must not have commenced before the award is announced. Applications must be for new research ideas that are coherent on their own and are cutting-edge.
  • Applicants are required to provide a formal statement of support from a senior member of their proposed host institution in the UK (normally expected to be a Pro-Vice-Chancellor or equivalent, or at minimum Head of Department/Faculty/Institute).
• Candidates should be based outside the UK at the time of application. Applicants who are working outside the UK but are employed primarily by a UK institution are not eligible to apply.
• Applicants must demonstrate that they have been in contact with their UK host institution prior to the application. Please note that the British Academy is not able to assist with locating or facilitating contact with UK host institutions.
• Duplicate applications for the same purpose to more than one British Academy funding programme will not be accepted.

For more information, visit British Academy.