The Fox Center for Humanistic Inquiry at Emory University is pleased to open applications for our one-year postdoctoral research fellowships. We invite applications from candidates from any humanistic discipline who are eager to be part of a community of scholars engaged in innovative and interdisciplinary research and conversations around our 2025-26 theme, Life/Story.
The Fox Center will appoint up to four postdoctoral fellows for the academic year 2025-26. Three positions are open field and one is in the field of poetics. Our postdoctoral fellowship in poetics reflects the importance of Emory’s Stuart A. Rose Manuscripts, Archives and Rare Book Library as a center for research in poetry.
Fellows will participate in a weekly interdisciplinary seminar, presenting their research at one of these meetings, and will teach one undergraduate course of their own design in the College of Arts and Sciences. They will also collaborate in the planning of Fox Center programming pertaining to the theme and engage in the Center's events.
Fellowships are for a period of ten months, August 1, 2025 – May 31, 2026, and carry a stipend and eligibility for a wide range of competitive benefits. All Postdoctoral Fellows are required to be in residence for the term of the fellowship.
Life/Story
How do the humanities capture a life, and in what ways does this genre—the craft of unearthing and rendering a life story—shed light upon key moments in time, social and political movements, critical junctures in history, or elements fundamental to a particular culture and place? How are different methodologies and epistemologies mobilized in telling the story of a life that also offer broad social and political commentaries? How does a single biography, in any medium, shed light upon central themes of the human condition?
We invite scholars whose research interests are resonant with such a panoramic view of “writing” a life. We envision that fellows may pursue research employing a range of historical, contemporary, social, cultural, artistic, and philosophical approaches to capturing a life, including but not limited to oral and archival histories, ethnography, philosophy, creative writing and film.
All postdoctoral fellows must hold a PhD (or its international equivalent, such as the DPhil). Applicants may not have held a doctorate for more than five years. Preference will be given to applicants who have not held prior postdoctoral fellowships. Applicants applying without a degree in hand must receive it by August 1, 2025.