Upcoming Events

Application Deadline: Faculty Book Proposal Workshop with Walter Biggins, Obermann Editor-in-Residence promotional image

Application Deadline: Faculty Book Proposal Workshop with Walter Biggins, Obermann Editor-in-Residence

Wednesday, September 9, 2026 5:00pm
111 Church Street

For this workshop, five UI faculty members will submit book proposal drafts for a collaborative feedback session on Wednesday, Oct. 7, from 9 a.m. to noon, led by Walter Biggins, editor-in-chief at University of Pennsylvania Press. The session is designed to help authors write a compelling book proposal, with a focus on crafting a strong pitch, identifying target audiences, and outlining the project’s structure. The workshop’s goal is for participants to walk away with a strong and cohesive book...

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, September 26, 2026, 3 pm

Recital Hall, Voxman...

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...

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...

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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

Open-Access Tools Make Research Available to All

Not so long ago, if you wanted to read The Odyssey, you needed several massive—and expensive—tomes: the original text, appendices of endnotes, maps, and family trees, maybe even a Greek dictionary. Today, thanks to digital humanists like Sarah Bond (Classics, CLAS) and Paul Dilley (Classics and Religious Studies, CLAS), you can access many classical texts online, for free, with notes...
human immunodeficiency virus

Reviving Biophilia—Mary Trachsel Considers Our Disconnect from the Natural World

Animals on Campus Humans share the state of Iowa with as many as 20 million hogs, in addition to millions of chickens and cows. In a state so densely populated with non-human animals, why are they so invisible to us on the University of Iowa campus? This wasn’t always the case. In the 1800s, a fence was erected around the Pentacrest to keep pigs off the grounds. An early professor of writing...
Noaquia Callahan portrait, German Fulbright award winner

A Q&A with 2016-17 Fulbright winner Noaquia Callahan

A Q&A with 2016-17 Fulbright winner Noaquia Callahan Authored by Benjamin Partridge About Noaquia: Noaquia Callahan, P.h.D. candidate in history at the University of Iowa and 2016-17 Fulbright grant winner. Noaquia Callahan, a Ph.D. candidate in history at the University of Iowa, is one of 13 Fulbright U.S. Student Program grant winners from the UI for 2016-17. Callahan was chosen as...
Cultural Textural Exchange.jpg

Andrew W. Mellon Sawyer Seminar to Focus on Eurasian Manuscripts in 2016-17

Cultural and Textual Exchanges: The Manuscript Across Pre-Modern Eurasia Exploring manuscript diversity before the printed book During the 2016-17 academic year, a core group of University of Iowa faculty and graduate students will work to map cultural exchanges across Eurasia from roughly 400 CE ­ ca. 1450 CE, by focusing on the development, distribution and sharing of manuscript...

Digital Bridges to Obermann - Summer 2016 Institute and Collaborations

This summer the Obermann Center will host a number of faculty projects thanks to the generous support of our Andrew W. Mellon Digital Bridges for Humanistic Inquiry partnership with Grinnell College. The goal of the grant is to experiment with ways that faculty and students from a liberal arts college and a research university can mutually enrich their scholarship and teaching through creative...

Why I Give to the Obermann Center - Ken Brown

The Obermann Center holds a special place in my heart. This is so not because of Director Teresa Mangum’s southern charm or the cookies in the kitchen, although both are gifts to all who visit. Instead, I love Obermann for what it offers to scholars on this campus, and for the opportunities it has given me to be in community with these very scholars. "Obermann offers the impetus and the...

HASTAC Scholars Reflect on Graduate Institute Symposium

On March 3-4, 2016, the Obermann Graduate Institute celebrated its tenth anniversary. In addition to welcoming back alumni of the program, including Tala Al-Rousan (Harvard), Ted Gutsche (Florida International University), Bridget Draxler (Monmouth College), and Craig Eley (ACLS Scholar, Wisconsin Public Radio), we were also joined by founding co-director David Redlawsk, currently at Rutgers and...

Cultivating Our Resilient Humanities Community - NHA visit establishes pilot program

On March 3, a group of thirty scholars, librarians, business owners, and arts administrators sat down to talk about their current and future work in supporting the humanities in Eastern Iowa. Convened by leaders from the National Humanities Alliance, including Stephen Kidd, Executive Director, and Matthew Van Hoose, Project Director (pictured) with assistance from the Obermann Center, the meeting...

Raising the Flag for the Humanities on Capitol Hill

Did you know that more people go to museums each year (850 million) than to all major league sports events and theme parks combined? Or that people with double majors up earnings by 2.3% while a double major that combines the arts, humanities, or social sciences with business or STEM can increase lifetime earnings up to 50%? Well, neither do most people, including elected officials Iowans send...

Teresa Mangum Named Secretary of National Humanities Alliance

Teresa Mangum, director of the Obermann Center, has been elected Secretary of the National Humanities Alliance Board of Directors, the largest humanities advocacy group in the country, located in Washington, D.C. The president of the board is David Marshall, Executive Vice Chancellor of the University of California-Santa Barbara. Mangum will be replacing Pauline Yu, the President of the...

Recent Events

Manuscript Forum (Imagining Latinidades Mellon Sawyer Seminar) promotional image

Manuscript Forum (Imagining Latinidades Mellon Sawyer Seminar)

Thursday, January 30, 2020 11:30am to 12:30pm
111 Church Street

Manuscript Forum led by Dr. Sujey Vega, one of the Series Editors of the Latinos in Chicago and the Midwest Series (University of Illinois Press). Dr. Vega will share tips about the publishing process particularly for books. 

This is a pre-event that is part of our Imagining the Latina/o/x Midwest Symposium taking place on Friday, January 31st at the Iowa City Public Library from 9:00am-4:30pm (https://events.uiowa.edu/28068). See our website for additional information: https:/...

Informational Meeting for Summer Humanities for the Public Good Internships promotional image

Informational Meeting for Summer Humanities for the Public Good Internships

Wednesday, December 18, 2019 4:00pm to 5:00pm
111 Church Street

Learn about the Summer 2020 Humanities for the Public Good Internship program. In addition to learning about the opportunities, expectations of participants, application process, you will also have the chance to talk with one of last year's interns and hear about their experience. 

Obermann Conversations Program: Domestic Stories promotional image

Obermann Conversations Program: Domestic Stories

Thursday, November 14, 2019 4:00pm to 5:00pm
Iowa City Public Library

How have relationships between domestic workers and employees changed over time, including around issues of race and gender? What are issues of pay injustice that have been true in the past and how are workers addressing such issues today? This Obermann Conversation includes a historian, a feminist podcaster, and a labor expert.

Catherine Stewart, a history professor from Cornell College and an Obermann Fellow-in-Residence, is working on a book, The New Maid: African American Women and Domestic...

Fascism and Anti-fascism, 1920-2020 – A talk by Geoff Eley promotional image

Fascism and Anti-fascism, 1920-2020 – A talk by Geoff Eley

Tuesday, November 12, 2019 12:30pm to 1:30pm
Iowa City Public Library

Geoff Eley, Karl Pohrt Distinguished University Professor of Contemporary History at the University of Michigan, will give a talk titled "Fascism and Anti-fascism, 1920–2020." Sponsored by the Obermann Working Group Circulating Cultures, Eley will pull from his extensive work in German and British history. Eley is interested in both the history of the Left and the history of the Right; history and film; historiography; and history and theory. He has recently begun teaching a large new...

Fascism and Anti-Fascism, 1920-2020 promotional image

Fascism and Anti-Fascism, 1920-2020

Tuesday, November 12, 2019 12:30pm
Iowa City Public Library

A free, public lecture by Dr. Geoff Eley
Professor of History, University of Michigan

Latina/o/x Citizenship and National Belonging (Sawyer Seminar Symposium) promotional image

Latina/o/x Citizenship and National Belonging (Sawyer Seminar Symposium)

Friday, November 8, 2019 (all day)
Iowa City Public Library

For this one-day symposium -- part of our yearlong Mellon Foundation-funded Sawyer Seminar on “Imagining Latinidades: Articulations of National Belonging” -- three speakers will address the ways Latina/o/x communities are integrated into and respond to dominant U.S. political and cultural social practices. Speakers will provide a strong historical foundation, attend to political processes, and draw out some of the less formal ways in which citizenship is imagined and practiced in Latina/o/x...