
Available Fellowships
Long-Term Awards | Short-Term Awards | Travel Grants and Exchange Fellowships
Long-Term Awards
The Huntington offers 14 long-term fellowships for nine to 12 months in residence, each with a stipend of $50,000. Although nine of these are open to scholars working on projects in any area where The Huntington’s collections are strong, there are specific awards for maritime history (the Kemble Fellowship), the history of medicine (the Molina Fellowship), and the history of science (the Dibner Fellowship). Three awards (the Thom Fellowships) are reserved for recent postdoctoral scholars.
Long-term fellows are expected to be in continuous residence at The Huntington, present at a two-day introductory symposium in September, and participate in weekly working group sessions from October to May.
Octavia E. Butler Fellowship
Eligibility: Only those who hold a Ph.D. or who have successfully defended a dissertation by the application deadline are eligible.
Tenure of fellowship: Between nine and 12 months
Value of award: $50,000
The Huntington is the repository of the literary archive of Octavia E. Butler (1947–2006), the first science fiction writer to receive a prestigious MacArthur Fellowship and the first African American woman to win widespread recognition writing in that genre. Applicants may be working from a variety of disciplinary perspectives on the ideas and issues explored by Butler in her published works, ranging from speculative fiction to Afrofuturism to environmental studies and biotechnology, but preference may be given to candidates who intend to make extensive use of the Butler archive during their residency.
Dibner Fellowship in the History of Science and Technology
Eligibility: Only those who hold a Ph.D. or who have successfully defended a dissertation by the application deadline are eligible.
Tenure of fellowship: Between nine and 12 months
Value of award: $50,000
Applicants must be pursuing scholarship in a field appropriate to The Huntington’s collections in the history of science and technology.
Dana and David Dornsife Fellowship
Eligibility: Only those who hold a Ph.D. or who have successfully defended a dissertation by the application deadline are eligible.
Tenure of fellowship: Between nine and 12 months
Value of award: $50,000
Applicants must be pursuing scholarship in a field appropriate to The Huntington’s collections. Preference may be given to projects in the history of the American West in general and of California in particular.
Kemble Fellowship in Maritime History
Eligibility: Only those who hold a Ph.D. or who have successfully defended a dissertation by the application deadline are eligible.
Tenure of fellowship: Between nine and 12 months
Value of award: $50,000
Applicants must be pursuing scholarship in a field appropriate to The Huntington’s collections in maritime history. Relevant fields might include the history of oceans and oceanography, coastlines and littorals, and global trade and migration.
Mellon Fellowship
Eligibility: Only those who hold a Ph.D. or who have successfully defended a dissertation by the application deadline are eligible.
Tenure of fellowship: Between nine and 12 months
Value of award: $50,000
Applicants must be pursuing scholarship in a field appropriate to The Huntington’s collections.
Molina Fellowship in the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences
Eligibility: Only those who hold a Ph.D. or who have successfully defended a dissertation by the application deadline are eligible.
Tenure of fellowship: Between nine and 12 months
Value of award: $50,000
Applicants must be pursuing scholarship in a field appropriate to The Huntington’s collections in the history of medicine and related sciences, including public health.
National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowships
Eligibility: Only those who hold a Ph.D. or who have successfully defended a dissertation by the application deadline are eligible. Applicants must be citizens of the United States or foreign nationals with a minimum of three years of U.S. residence.
Tenure of fellowship: Between nine and 12 months
Value of award: $50,000 ($4,200 per month from the NEH, the balance of the stipend from Huntington funds)
Applicants must be pursuing scholarship in a field appropriate to The Huntington’s collections.
Barbara Thom Postdoctoral Fellowships
Eligibility: Nontenured faculty
Tenure of fellowship: Between nine and 12 months
Value of award: $50,000
The Thom Fellowships are intended to support nontenured faculty who are revising their dissertation for publication as their first monograph. Applicants must be pursuing scholarship in a field appropriate to The Huntington’s collections and must have received the Ph.D. between Jan. 1, 2018, and Dec. 31, 2020.
Short-Term Awards
- Francis Bacon Foundation Fellowships in the history and literature of Renaissance England
- The Cheng Fellowship in the History of the Asian American Experience in the United States
- The Trent R. Dames Fellowship in the History of Civil Engineering
- The Dibner Fellowship in the History of Science and Technology
- Christopher Isherwood Foundation Fellowships
- The Gloria R. Lothrop Fellowship in Western American Women’s History
- The Reese Fellowship in American Bibliography and the History of the Book in the Americas
- The Francis J. Weber Research Fellowship in Roman Catholic History
Travel Grants and Exchange Fellowships for Study Abroad
The following fellowships operate on a different funding model:
The Huntington offers several joint professorships and collaborative fellowships with other institutions and organizations. See Joint Professorships/Collaborative Fellowships for more information.