Boost for early career researchers in humanities

Art | University 18 Mar 11 Oxford University has staked its claim as the place to be for early career researchers by offering what is believed to be the largest number of post-doctoral research fellowships in the history of the humanities division. Eight post-doctoral fellowships are being offered for two-year fixed terms in eight different research areas spanning ten faculties in the humanities, as well as the Bodleian Libraries and the Oxford e-Research Centre. The fellowships are being funded by the Andrew W Mellon Foundation. Professor Sally Shuttleworth, head of the humanities division, said of the fellowships: 'They are aimed at boosting the research and all-round development of very promising early career scholars in that crucial time post-thesis when jobs that allow one to continue high-quality research are few and far between. The University had five Mellon postdocs in 2009 but none last year. Dr Lauren Hall-Lew, a former Mellon postdoc at Oxford who is now a lecturer in sociolinguistics at the University of Edinburgh, said: 'Having a Mellon Postdoctoral Fellowship at Oxford changed my life. In less than one year I went from being fresh out of an American PhD program to having in a permanent lectureship in the UK, and it was only possible because of that fellowship.