Upcoming Events & Deadlines

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...

Application Deadline: Book Ends Book Completion Workshop promotional image

Application Deadline: Book Ends Book Completion Workshop

Thursday, May 31, 2029 (all day)
111 Church Street

Books Ends—Obermann Book Completion Workshop supports University of Iowa faculty from disciplines in which publishing a monograph is required for tenure and promotion. The award is designed to assist faculty members turn promising manuscripts into important, field-changing, published books.

Applications are accepted on a rolling basis.

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News

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Obermann Center symposium’s ‘Frequências’ film festival explores Afro-Brazilian cinema

Zhenya Loughney
The Daily Iowan
The door of no return; the reinvention of belonging; Blackness in Brazil; these topics and more were the focus of this year’s Obermann Humanities Symposium. Presented in Iowa City by the Obermann Humanities Symposium & International Programs Major Project Award, the “Frequências” festival displayed lectures, cinema screenings, interventions, exhibits, and performances by contemporary Afro-Brazilian artists and scholars discussing Black diaspora.
Ariani Friedl

Building Bridges: The MOSTRA Brazilian Film Festival

Cris Lira
Cris Lira: Tell us a little bit about yourself and how the idea for the Mostra: Brazilian Film Series has started.   Ariani Friedl: I am Brazilian, 'gaúcha' (RS), and I have been living in the United States for over 50 years.  I worked at the University of Illinois @ Chicago for over 20 years as Director of the John Nuveen Center for International Affairs.  I was a member of the Board of Directors of the International Latino Cultura Center for over 15 years and also organized the Chicago Latino Film Festival in 2006 when our Director was on a leave of absence.  I have the fortune of meeting many of our Brazilian filmmakers who attended the Latino Festival which always brings 3 - 4 Brazilian films.   The question always posed by our Brazilian filmmakers was:  "How can we better publicize and where else can we show our Brazilian cinema in the United States?" The idea of creating a festival with only Brazilian films in the Chicago area was born from this and it developed with another idea of bringing films with social conscience to be discussed in universities and other cultural and educational centers. C.L.: Could you please tell us how do you select the films to be featured in the series?  A.F.: I bring to our festival every year, different Brazilian film critics and filmmakers.  I also have collaborators in SP who attend many of our film festivals in Brazil and help me collect a list of films with relevant social content, and also films related to our culture (art, music, literature, dance...), history, environment, etc...  We compile these in a document with trailers and synopses and present them to my Curatorial Committee (composed of professors, critics, and experts in cinema) for a decision in which films we will invite to our festival.
Lauren Burrell Cox

Lauren Burrell Cox is Obermann's New Assistant Director!

We're happy to announce that Lauren Burrell Cox has become Obermann's new Assistant Director! She'll be working with our director, Teresa Mangum, to design, plan, promote and conduct programs and to oversee communications for the Center.
Frequencias codirectors

Frequências Symposium: A Discussion with Three Co-organizers

Daniel Vorwerk
International Programs
Taking Brazil’s new Black cinema as its point of departure, Frequências: Contemporary Afro-Brazilian Cinema & the Black Diaspora will feature the emerging wave of young Afro-Brazilian filmmakers, curators, programmers, and scholars whose art and scholarship have already had an impact on international cinema. Organized by Christopher Harris, Janaína Oliveira, and Cristiane Lira, this 2022-23 Obermann Humanities Symposium and International Programs Major Projects Award takes place March 30 – April 1, 2023, in Iowa City. Below is a discussion with Harris, Oliveira, and Lira.
Hand holding up mirror, reflecting peninsula near bridge

Frequências symposium a historical gathering of Brazilian filmmakers and scholars on the UI campus

Daniel Vorwerk
International Programs
Taking Brazil’s new Black cinema as its point of departure, Frequências: Contemporary Afro-Brazilian Cinema & the Black Diaspora brings together filmmakers, artists, scholars, and critics from across the globe to explore new ways of thinking about the Black diaspora. This 2022-23 Obermann Humanities Symposium and International Programs Major Projects Award takes place March 30 – April 1, 2023, in Iowa City. Organized by Christopher Harris, F. Wendell Miller associate professor of cinematic arts at the University of Iowa; Janaína Oliveira, curator and researcher at the Federal Instituto of Rio de Janeiro; and Cristiane Lira, supervisor of Portuguese at the University of Georgia, the symposium will feature the emerging wave of young Afro-Brazilian filmmakers, curators, programmers, and scholars whose art and scholarship have already had an impact on international cinema.
HPG logo

Working to Create Nets: A Humanities for the Public Good Update

Back when we all traveled regularly to conferences, we did so to share research, to learn from colleagues, and to form new relationships, even friendships, rooted in shared intellectual interests. Conferences help graduate students build skills—capturing complex arguments in short presentations, public speaking, asking helpful rather than grandstanding questions, connecting with fellow experts, and more. In other words, conferences are for networking.
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Recent Events

Humanities Without Walls Seed Grant Info Session (virtual) promotional image

Humanities Without Walls Seed Grant Info Session (virtual)

Friday, September 3, 2021 8:30am
Virtual

The Obermann Center for Advanced Studies is proud to be a member of the Andrew W. Mellon funded Humanities Without Walls consortium. We will be supporting collaborative applications for teams led by one or more University of Iowa faculty members that might include teams of faculty, staff, community partners, and graduate students for the 2022-23 and 2023-24 academic years.

If you are interested in applying:

please read the information below, including the PDF, contact Obermann Director...
Book Ends Information Session (virtual) promotional image

Book Ends Information Session (virtual)

Wednesday, September 1, 2021 3:30pm to 4:30pm
Virtual

Learn more about the application process and details of the Book Ends Book Completion program. At this info session, Obermann Center Director Teresa Mangum will share her vision for the program and answer questions. 

REGISTER to receive the Zoom link.

Co-sponsored by the Obermann Center for Advanced Studies and the Office of the Vice President for Research and Economic Development, Books Ends supports University of Iowa faculty from disciplines in which publishing a monograph is required for...

Application Deadline: Obermann Spelman Rockefeller Community Scholar promotional image

Application Deadline: Obermann Spelman Rockefeller Community Scholar

Wednesday, July 14, 2021 5:00pm

For the second year, the Obermann Center for Advanced Studies is funding a graduate student Community Scholar to work with a local non-profit. This year, we are partnering with Open Heartland, a grassroots, community-based initiative that serves Latino immigrant families living in Johnson County, many of whom have escaped violence, extreme poverty, and lack of educational and health resources. Located on Iowa City's southeast side, Open Heartland has expanded during the pandemic in response to...

Clarifying Purpose in Your Current Academic Project promotional image

Clarifying Purpose in Your Current Academic Project

Friday, June 18, 2021 9:00am to 12:00pm
Virtual

Where We’ve Been and Where We’re Going—Clarifying Purpose in Your Current Academic Project with Humanities for the Public Good and Liberating Structures
June 14 + June 18, 9 am - 12noon

When the pandemic hit, many of you set aside academic projects to respond to campus and community needs. This pair of free, virtual Liberating Structures workshops invites participants to consider how you might carry hard won knowledge from this year into your current arts or scholarly project as we re-emerge...

Clarifying Purpose in Your Current Academic Project promotional image

Clarifying Purpose in Your Current Academic Project

Monday, June 14, 2021 9:00am to 12:00pm
Virtual

Where We’ve Been and Where We’re Going—Clarifying Purpose in Your Current Academic Project with Humanities for the Public Good and Liberating Structures
June 14 + June 18, 9 am - 12noon

When the pandemic hit, many of you set aside academic projects to respond to campus and community needs. This pair of free, virtual Liberating Structures workshops invites participants to consider how you might carry hard won knowledge from this year into your current arts or scholarly project as we re-emerge...

Summer Institute on Cross-Disciplinary Graduate Education promotional image

Summer Institute on Cross-Disciplinary Graduate Education

Tuesday, June 8 3:00pm to Friday, June 11, 2021 12:00pm
Virtual

How can cross-disciplinary, project-based courses serve graduate students across the University? This question is under investigation at the University of Iowa by both the Andrew W. Mellon-funded Humanities for the Public Good PHD initiative and the National Science Foundation NRT-Funded Sustainable Water Development Graduate Program as well as implicitly in interdisciplinary degrees in many corners of the University.

In the past decade, groups of UI faculty members have taught “Big Ideas”...