Summer Seminars and Institutes for College and
University Teachers
This program supports intensive two- to six-week projects in which fifteen to twenty-five college and university faculty members, working with scholarly experts, engage in collegial study of significant texts and topics in the humanities. Participants receive a stipend to help defray expenses.
Guidelines URL: www.neh.gov/grants/guidelines/seminars.html
For participants: www.neh.gov//projects/si-university.html

EH-50077, Western Michigan University:
The Cathedral and Culture: Medieval York.
In the summer of 2007 the Richard Rawlinson Center for Anglo-Saxon and Manuscript Research at the Medieval Institute, Western Michigan University, in collaboration with the Centre for Medieval Studies at York University, held a summer institute for college and university teachers, “The Cathedral and Culture: Medieval York.” The institute took place at Britain’s renowned Gothic cathedral York Minster, and at York University. Institute directors Dee Dyas and Paul Szarmach used York Minster as a teaching laboratory for the study of Anglo-Saxon England and Northumbria. Participants made use of verbal, visual, and material evidence in their study. The Medieval Institute offered participants venues for the publication and dissemination of the work that they produced following the institute.
Project URL:
www.lpc.wmich.edu/medieval/research/rawl/neh2007/letter.htm

FS-50151, Wesleyan University:
Traditions Into Dialogue: Confucianism and Contemporary Virtue Ethics.
In the summer of 2008 Wesleyan University hosted a seminar for college faculty seeking to advance their knowledge of Chinese philosophy. The seminar, “Traditions Into Dialogue: Confucianism and Contemporary Virtue Ethics,” was directed by Stephen Angle and Michael Slote. Over the course of six weeks, participants explored the topic of virtue ethics—the branch of ethics that emphasizes character, rather than rules or consequences, as the key element in ethical thinking—in both Western and Chinese philosophy. They did so through intensive reading and discussion of core texts from both classical Confucianism and neo-Confucianism, in dialogue with works from the Western virtue ethics tradition. The seminar thus encouraged cross-cultural dialogue and developed the capacity of Western-trained philosophers to draw on Chinese sources in their ongoing philosophical research. Participants will present their work at a major international conference on Chinese philosophy and virtue ethics in Beijing in 2011.
Project URL: neh08.wesleyan.edu/