Upcoming Events

Eleanor Waltzes: Women’s Poetry and Music for Eleanor Roosevelt During the Great Depression promotional image

Eleanor Waltzes: Women’s Poetry and Music for Eleanor Roosevelt During the Great Depression

Saturday, September 26, 2026 3:00pm
Voxman Music Building

“Eleanor Waltzes” honors First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt through performances of songs and poetry created and sent to her by American women. The event will also feature an exhibit of materials from the Iowa Women’s Archives and a “making do” reception with 1930s recipes. “Eleanor Waltzes” is part of Sounding the Nation at 250, a series of commemorative concerts surrounding the U.S. Semiquincentennial sponsored by the Society for American Music.

Saturday, Sept. 26, 2026, 3 p.m.

Recital Hall, Voxman...

Registration Deadline: Junior Faculty and Graduate Student Session with Walter Biggins, Obermann Editor-in-Residence promotional image

Registration Deadline: Junior Faculty and Graduate Student Session with Walter Biggins, Obermann Editor-in-Residence

Wednesday, September 30, 2026 (all day)
111 Church Street

University of Iowa junior faculty and graduate students at all stages are invited to join Walter Biggins—editor-in-chief at the University of Pennsylvania Press—for a light breakfast and a conversation about turning an article, thesis, or dissertation into a book on Tuesday, Oct. 6, from 9–10:30 a.m. at the Obermann Center for Advanced Studies library. Please bring any questions you have about that process or about scholarly publishing in general.

Register by Wednesday, September 30.

Biggins is...

Registration Deadline: Undergraduate Career Session with Walter Biggins, Obermann Editor-in-Residence promotional image

Registration Deadline: Undergraduate Career Session with Walter Biggins, Obermann Editor-in-Residence

Wednesday, September 30, 2026 (all day)
111 Church Street

Interested in a career in publishing? In this session on Tuesday, Oct. 6, at noon at the Obermann Center for Advanced Studies, Walter Biggins, editor-in-chief at University of Pennsylvania Press, will discuss his career path and editorial work. This is an opportunity for students to hear directly from a distinguished professional about the realities of the field and to gain insight into how to prepare for a career in publishing. Pizza will be provided!

Please register by Wednesday, September 30.

B...

RSVP Deadline: AMA with Walter Biggins, Obermann Editor-in-Residence promotional image

RSVP Deadline: AMA with Walter Biggins, Obermann Editor-in-Residence

Wednesday, September 30, 2026 (all day)
111 Church Street

UI faculty, students, and staff are invited to attend ask-me-anything group discussions with Walter Biggins—editor-in-chief at University of Pennsylvania Press—at 1 p.m. and 3 p.m. on Monday, Oct. 1 at the Obermann Center for Advanced Studies. Questions might address finding an editor, pitching a book, writing a book proposal, how the publishing process works, etc.

There will be two back-to-back discussions; you may attend one or both.

Please RSVP by Wednesday, September 30.

Free and open to all.

Bi...

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Upcoming Application Deadlines

Upcoming Application Deadlines

Application Deadline: Obermann International Fellowships (Spring 2027) promotional image

Application Deadline: Obermann International Fellowships (Spring 2027)

Friday, September 18, 2026 11:59pm
111 Church Street

The UI Obermann Center for Advanced studies is accepting applications for Spring 2027 Obermann International Fellowships. This program offers dedicated space, time, and funding for interdisciplinary scholars to collaborate on innovative research at the University of Iowa. Up to eight international fellowships will be granted every academic year. Applicants must be active researchers at an accredited institution of higher learning outside of the United States or independent researchers/artists...

Application Deadline: Book Ends, Obermann Book Completion Workshop promotional image

Application Deadline: Book Ends, Obermann Book Completion Workshop

Wednesday, September 23, 2026 5:00pm
Virtual

Books Ends supports University of Iowa faculty from disciplines in which publishing a monograph is required for tenure and promotion. The award is designed to assist UI faculty members of all ranks and with significant research responsibilities to turn promising manuscripts into important, field-changing, published books.

Book Ends brings together a panel of senior scholars for a candid, constructive three-hour virtual workshop on a faculty member’s book manuscript. The award provides a $500...

Application Deadline: Obermann Interdisciplinary Research Grants (Summer 2027) promotional image

Application Deadline: Obermann Interdisciplinary Research Grants (Summer 2027)

Wednesday, October 7, 2026 5:00pm
111 Church Street

Obermann Interdisciplinary Research Grants (IDRG) foster collaborative scholarship and creative work by offering recipients time and space to exchange new ideas leading to invention, creation, and publication. IDRG groups work at the Obermann Center for two weeks, usually in July and/or August. Applicants propose work on a project with colleagues from across the University, across disciplines within their own department, or with colleagues from other parts of the country or the world. Projects...

Application Deadline: Obermann Symposium Directorship (2027–28) promotional image

Application Deadline: Obermann Symposium Directorship (2027–28)

Wednesday, October 28, 2026 5:00pm
111 Church Street

Is there a burning topic in your discipline or a topic that cuts across disciplines that we should bring to campus? Is there a format for the conversation that can energize an intellectual community around that topic? That might be the perfect topic for an Obermann Symposium!

In addition to a compelling topic, we invite co-directors to propose national and international speakers who can offer richly diverse perspectives on the symposium theme. We also want to highlight the work of UI and local...

Application Deadline: Small Important Project Grants promotional image

Application Deadline: Small Important Project Grants

Thursday, April 1, 2027 5:00pm
111 Church Street

This new Obermann Center program offers modest yet swift support for those portions of research and creative endeavors by UI scholars that are important toward advancing a project but do not have enough funding from other sources. We will grant 10 awards of $500 or less per academic year. Note that funds need to be spent by June 30 of each year.

Eligibility: Open to all University of Iowa faculty and staff researchers who have not received a SIP award in the past academic year.

Application...

Application Deadline: Obermann Working Groups (2027–30) promotional image

Application Deadline: Obermann Working Groups (2027–30)

Wednesday, April 7, 2027 5:00pm
111 Church Street

Obermann Center Working Groups provide space, structure, and discretionary funding for groups led by faculty that may include advanced graduate students, staff members, and community members with a shared intellectual interest.

Groups have used this opportunity to share their work in progress or draw up a set of readings they want to undertake and discuss. Others have organized conferences, applied for grants together, written articles together, designed new courses, taken field trips, organized...

News

Ashley Cheyemi McNeil

Ashley Cheyemi McNeil Appointed 2019-21 HPG Postdoctoral Scholar

Interdisciplinary scholar Dr. Ashley Cheyemi Rae McNeil has been appointed the 2019–2021 Postdoctoral Scholar for the Andrew W. Mellon–Funded Humanities for the Public Good (HPG) initiative. McNeil earned her bi-national PhD in English from Georgia State University and in American Studies from the Obama Institute for Transnational American Studies at Johannes Gutenberg University in Germany. As...

Misfitting: Symposium Connects Disabilities Studies Scholars, Shines Light on Need for Scholarly Leadership at UI

Tricia Zebrowski and Douglas Baynton pulled off a wonderful finale this spring. The two retiring professors—Zebrowski is in her first year as an Emeritus in Communication Sciences & Disorders, while Baynton retired in May 2019 from History—co-directed “Misfitting: Disability Broadly Considered,” the 2019 Obermann Humanities Symposium. During three days in April, the pair helped to host eminent...

Ortiz-Guzmán Appointed 2019-20 Sawyer Seminar Postdoctoral Fellow

Directors of the 2019–20 Andrew W. Mellon Sawyer Seminar, “Imagining Latinidades: Articulations of National Belonging,” have selected interdisciplinary scholar Dr. Lisa Ortiz-Guzmán as the Seminar’s Postdoctoral Fellow. Ortiz-Guzmán earned her PhD in Educational Policy Studies with graduate minors in Latina/o Studies and Gender & Women’s Studies from the University of Illinois at Urbana...

Not Distracted: Aiden Bettine Balances Traditional Scholarship and Public Engagement Projects

Aiden Bettine, the first Humanities for the Public Good (HPG) Graduate Fellow, is already embodying the goals of this grant. A historian with a strong commitment to public scholarship, Aiden is pushing the boundaries of his discipline in experimental and collaborative directions. With funding and support from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the Office of the Vice President for Research, and the...

Four CLAS Graduate Students Chosen for National Humanities Center Education Program

Four University of Iowa PHD candidates have been selected to attend the 2019 Graduate Student Summer Residency Program at the National Humanities Center in the Research Triangle Park in North Carolina. From July 15 to 26, Aiden M. Bettine (History), Enrico Bruno (English), Hadley Galbraith (French & Italian), and Mary Wise (History) will join approximately 100 fellow humanities graduate students...

Andrew Tubbs: Scholar, musician, disability advocate, comedian

Andrew Tubbs would like to see more researchers recognize the influence that disability has on their work—no matter the field of study. “It’s beneficial for researchers to understand that disability inherently intersects with their work,” Tubbs says. “Being able to come at issues, research questions, and problems from a disability perspective helps nuance arguments.” The University of Iowa...
Street pickers with can carriers in Matanzas, Cuba

Yellow Fever's History of Humans, Microbes, and Ideas

Yellow fever was once a terrifying killer that violently took the lives of half of the people who contracted it. It killed workers building canals, soldiers engaged in sieges, and investors on fact-finding missions. A viral disease spread between humans and primates, it is caused by a species of mosquito that prefers clean, fresh water. Before this was proven decisively in 1901, yellow fever was a...

NHA Advocacy Day

Obermann Director Teresa Mangum joined hundreds of humanities faculty members, center directors, and leaders of professional organizations like the Modern Language Association and the American Historical Association in Washington, DC. As part of the annual NHA Advocacy Day, they shared the educational, social, and economic benefits of the arts and humanities. The NHA especially encourages...
Esco in his 20s wearing a suit and bowtie

An Aerial View—Remembering Esco Obermann

Esco Obermann embodied interdisciplinarity. That's him in the photo to the right, upside down on his parents' windmill in Yarmouth, Iowa. (Look closely—the soles of his shoes are aligned with the motor.) Esco, one of nine siblings, grew up doing acrobatics on his family's farm in southeastern Iowa—backbends on bulls, rope stunts in haylofts, L-sits on windmills—as if driven to seek new...
Nina G

Nina G: Stuttering comic walks the line between satire and issue advocacy

Bay Area comedian Nina G works tough territory. She plays gigs at clubs with names like “Nightlife on Mars” and “The Laugh Boat.” She stutters. And she’s really funny about it. While most stand-up comics engage their audiences through relatable stories, Nina G’s work pulls that kind observational humor into the broader intersection of comedy, satire and issue advocacy. That’s tough territory...

Recent Events

I Spy: How to Read a Grant Application — An Obermann GET IT DONE! Lunchtime Workshop promotional image

I Spy: How to Read a Grant Application — An Obermann GET IT DONE! Lunchtime Workshop

Wednesday, February 3, 2021 12:30pm to 1:30pm
Virtual

The first step to secure a grant is to learn to be a careful close reader of calls for proposals. What key terms and concepts should you seek? How does the grant language match the funder’s mission? How can you actively demonstrate that your project will help funders achieve their goals? We’ve asked Kristi Fitzpatrick—Director of the Grant Support Office in the UI College of Liberal Arts & Sciences and one of the campus’ sharpest readers and writers of grants—to share her advice.

Free and open...

Podcasting with Purpose: Annie Galvin promotional image

Podcasting with Purpose: Annie Galvin

Thursday, January 28, 2021 4:00pm to 5:00pm
Virtual

Calling all podcasters, podcast enthusiasts, and podcast newbies! Learn from expert podcasters about the craft of podcasting with purpose, from the nuts and bolts of recording and editing audio to the intellectual and creative labor of audio storytelling. As part of our goal to prepare graduate students for a wide range of careers serving the public good, Humanities for the Public Good is exploring new and innovative methods of interpretation, storytelling, and meaning-making. The Podcasting...

Cultural Postmortem 2020 promotional image

Cultural Postmortem 2020

Wednesday, January 27, 2021 4:30pm
Virtual

How can artists and scholars help the nation contend with the peril in which we find ourselves—starting with our own campuses? The 2020 US presidential race was one of the most politically and ideologically divisive and contentious races that we’ve ever seen. And as the events of January 6, 2021 have illustrated, the nation remains divided to the point where political leaders at the highest level are challenging election results without any evidence or basis in reality and a largely white group...

Institute for Teaching with Writing promotional image

Institute for Teaching with Writing

Thursday, January 21, 2021 10:00am
Virtual

This series of four two-hour workshops is an introduction to teaching with writing. Topics include creating engaging writing assignments, responding to student writing efficiently and effectively, and using informal writing and peer workshops. Registration now open

NOTE: All instructors welcome, but this series is primarily designed for instructors teaching content-oriented courses (i.e. courses in the social sciences, history, art, philosophy, and the natural sciences) rather than writing...

Institute for Teaching with Writing promotional image

Institute for Teaching with Writing

Tuesday, January 19, 2021 10:00am
Virtual

This series of four two-hour workshops is an introduction to teaching with writing. Topics include creating engaging writing assignments, responding to student writing efficiently and effectively, and using informal writing and peer workshops. Registration now open

NOTE: All instructors welcome, but this series is primarily designed for instructors teaching content-oriented courses (i.e. courses in the social sciences, history, art, philosophy, and the natural sciences) rather than writing...

Food Insecurity in Johnson County: An Obermann Conversation promotional image

Food Insecurity in Johnson County: An Obermann Conversation

Thursday, January 14, 2021 7:00pm
Virtual

As of five years ago, about 14% of Johnson County residents were considered food insecure, meaning that they had limited or uncertain access to certain and nutritious food. After nearly a year of COVID-19 affecting employment and housing, those numbers are much greater. In this conversation, Obermann Center Teresa Mangum will talk with panelists about how food insecurity is experienced by UI students, children and families in our local schools, and others who are grappling with this urgent issue...