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What Grant Program Fits My Digital Project? 

May 31, 2023
Crossroad
Photo caption

Crossroad

Andra Brinzanuic, Flickr

(updated from original post on Sept 26, 2019) 

The good news is that digital humanities work is funded in every division at the National Endowment for the Humanities. The challenge is navigating through the NEH’s extensive list of funding opportunities to find the right program to fund your digital project. 

The Office of Digital Humanities (ODH) remains the home for funding experimental, innovative digital methods and infrastructure (software) projects in humanities research, teaching and learning, public engagement, and scholarly communications. Once those methods and technologies are honed, replicable models designed, or extensible free and open-source software built, that work may be funded in other divisions in the NEH. 

As you consider developing a proposal for a digital humanities project, think about the types of activities you want to fund, who the work is designed for, and what the final products will be. 

Below is a quick guide to help you navigate the existing grant programs that support digital projects at the NEH.  You may also want to review this guide to funding digital projects at small, regional, and minority-serving institutions. 

New Methods, Software, Critique

Are you developing innovative digital methods or workflows? 

Are you designing or enhancing open-source software for implementing digital humanities research? 

Are building or expanding upon digital platforms or infrastructure that enables and supports humanities research and publishing? 

 Are you pursuing research that examines history, criticism, or philosophy of digital culture or effects of technology on society? 

Does your institution wish to sustain mature and widely-used digital projects?

Are you an individual faculty or staff member working on a digital humanities project of any kind at an HBCU, HSI, or Tribal College? 

Collections and Access

Are you considering digitizing or building a database of digitized collections? 

Do you want to enable access to existing collections through visualizations such as a map or social network? 

Are you developing online reference resources like dictionaries and encyclopedia? 

Are you at small or mid-size institution or a minority-serving institution with digital collections seeking to assess their preservation and storage needs? 

  • Preservation Assistance Grants for Small Institutions, Division of Preservation and Access 

Are you using digital means to collect oral histories or capture historical resources in communities endangered by climate events or the Covid-19 pandemic?  

Are you seeking to address major challenges in preserving or providing access to  
humanities collections and resources, including collections and data standards? 

Are you engaging in experimental methods for analyzing, accessing, or digitizing collections? 

Are you using digital technology to record, document, or archive endangered languages? 

Are you an individual faculty or staff member working on a digital humanities project related to institutional or community archival collections at an HBCU, HSI, or Tribal College? 

Digital Editions and Publications

Are you collaborating with a team using established digital methods for humanities research resulting in a major digital project, website, journal article, edited collection, special issue of a journal, book? 

Are you an individual scholar developing an interpretative project that requires digital expression? 

Are you an individual scholar engaging in digital methods for humanities research resulting in an article or book, including an edition or translation?  

Are you building a digital documentary, critical edition, or translation project with an existing software platform? 

Are you an individual faculty or staff member working on a digital critical edition or publication at an HBCU, HSI, or Tribal College? 

Digital Public Engagement

Are you designing a website, VR experience, or mobile app with a strong storytelling element with a collaborative team for public audiences? 

Are you developing new software or digital methods for public engagement? 

Are you documenting a community’s history or cultural practices for an interpretive research project? 

Are you using digital means to collect oral histories or capture historical resources in communities endangered by climate events or the Covid-19 pandemic?  

Are you an individual faculty or staff member working on a digital public humanities at an HBCU, HSI, or Tribal College? 

DH Curricula & Pedagogy

Are you designing an interdisciplinary digital humanities minor/major for undergraduates? 

 Do you wish to create curriculum-based DH projects at the college-level with and/or for your students or members of your local community (ie, Open Educational Resources, podcasts, websites)? 

Do you plan to research the effectiveness of online learning or digital pedagogy in the humanities? 

DH Professional Development

Are you developing national or regional training in digital humanities? 

Are you developing training in digital preservation or technical art history? 

Are you designing summer institutes on a humanities theme that integrates digital methods? 

The questions above are designed to help you find the best funding opportunity for your digital project that aligns with the goals, approaches, and audiences for your work. We know it is hard, which is why NEH program staff are here to help. 

We encourage you to start early and to contact NEH staff. Each grant program lists a contact email, so take advantage of a consultation. To reach the Office of Digital Humanities, send us an email, @email. We will do our best to advise you as you begin planning your next digital project.