Group items tagged

The Sociology Program supports basic research on all forms of human social organization -- societies, institutions, groups and demography -- and processes of individual and institutional change. The Program encourages theoretically focused empirical investigations aimed at improving the explanation of fundamental social processes. Included is research on organizations and organizational behavior, population dynamics, social movements, social groups, labor force participation, stratification and mobility, family, social networks, socialization, gender roles, and the sociology of science and technology. The Program supports both original data collections and secondary data analysis that use the full range of quantitative and qualitative methodological tools. Theoretically grounded projects that offer methodological innovations and improvements for data collection and analysis are also welcomed. As part of its effort to encourage and support projects that explicitly integrate education and basic research, the Sociology Program provides support to improve the conduct of doctoral dissertation projects undertaken by doctoral students enrolled in U.S. universities when the dissertation research is conducted in a scientifically sound manner and it offers strong potential for enhancing more general scientific knowledge. The Sociology Program funds doctoral dissertation research to defray direct costs associated with conducting research, for example, dataset acquisition, additional statistical or methodological training, meeting with scholars associated with original datasets, and fieldwork away from the student's home campus.

With the triad of concepts "utopia, experience and threat", three of the key references to conflicting social value systems from ancient times to today are touched upon: Social movements inspired by utopias determine ideal preconceptions of politics, religion and society and fight for their realization. In societies that see themselves as democracies, people have experiences, which they mobilize in a way that is critical of democracy - be it against democracy as such or against specific aspects of the relevant established democratic order. The historically - and currently - frequently found references to conflicting social value systems is the impression of threat, as a result of which, for example, ruling elites deploy their law enforcement forces against social movements, various social groups fight for re-order and new order, religiously based preconceptions of society or justice come into conflict, or social inequality becomes a political issue. All three points of reference can be utilized for historical research into conflict histories surrounding the correct order and just society. They expand the theme of the funding program beyond the classic fields of protest and revolutionary history, or the history of constitutions, elections and political parties - which are likewise part of it all - to include a multiperspectival history of conflict and culture surrounding the right order in society and politics.

The Association for Jewish Studies is pleased to announce the Berman Foundation Dissertation Fellowships in Support of Research in the Social Scientific Study of the Contemporary American Jewish Community. The Berman Fellowships - two awards of $16,000 each for the 2014-15 academic year -aim to support the development and expansion of the field of the social scientific study of Jewish Americans and the contemporary Jewish-American experience; enhance funding opportunities for up-and-coming scholars in the midst of institutional cutbacks in higher education; and encourage graduate students in sociology, social psychology, social anthropology, demography, social work, economics, and political science to expand their research to include the study of North American Jewry. Fellowships will be awarded for one academic year, with the possibility of renewal for a second year. Preference will be given to applicants seeking support for doctoral research, but requests for funding to support the writing phase of the dissertation will also be considered. Support for this project is generously provided by the Mandell L. and Madeleine H. Berman Foundation.

The Max-Planck Institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity, Department of Religious Diversity in Göttingen is offering The Ph.D. fellowships are for 3-4 years. The dissertation will be defended at Utrecht University. The postdoctoral fellowships are for one or two years. The research will be done in collaboration with the Center for the Study of Ethnic and Cultural Diversity in China at Minzu University in Beijing. The projects have to be on the following topics: 1. Study of the relations between Yi and Miao in Sichuan, Yunnan, and Vietnam 2. Study of the effects on ethnic minorities of the opening up of S.W. China to S.E. Asia 3. Social networks beyond ethnicity in China: Case study of the classmates and alumni of Minzu Requirements: For Postdoc: Ph.D. in Social /Cultural Anthropology, Religious Studies, Sociology, Political Science or other related disciplines of the Social Sciences or Humanities. Fluency in English and Mandarin Chinese is expected. For Ph.D. candidates: MA in Social /Cultural Anthropology, Religious Studies, Sociology, Political Science or other related disciplines of the Social Sciences or Humanities. Fluency in English and Mandarin Chinese is expected.

Under the RFP, the social media giant is offering awards to researchers interested in exploring the societal issues of misinformation and polarization related to social communication technologies. Priority research areas of interest include: Health Misinformation - Proposals to better understand the health misinformation ecosystem on social media, including how to categorize and detect such content, how it spreads, the motivations that drive creation/distribution, the downstream effects of exposure, and how to measure and conduct effective interventions. Quantifying Harms of Misinformation - Proposals that explore how to best measure the harms that result from misinformation. Information Processing of Sensational, Hateful, Divisive, or Provocative Problematic Content - Proposals that explore the social, psychological, and cognitive variables involved in the consumption of "gray area" content experiences - sensational, provocative, divisive, hateful, misleading, or biased information - received and produced on social media platforms. Affective Polarization - Proposals that explore measurement, processes, and effects of polarization, particularly affective polarization (whether political, religious, ethnic, or linguistic). In addition to advances in attitudinal and behavioral measurement, the company is particularly interested in causal models of polarization driven by informational, environmental, demographic, and institutional factors, especially when related to online communication or networks.

The Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations is accepting proposals from non-Unitarian Universalist groups in the U.S. and Canada for community organizing campaigns aimed at creating systemic change in the economic, social, and political structures that affect the lives of those who have been excluded from resources, power, and the right to determination. Through the Fund for a Just Society, UUAC supports projects that are less likely to receive conventional funding because of the innovative or challenging nature of the work or the economic and social status of the constituency. UUAC does not fund social services, educational programs, or advocacy projects. Grants are not awarded for the purposes of re-granting, equipment, capital campaigns, politically partisan efforts, educational institutions, medical or scientific research, or cultural programs. The organization will consider the funding of films, publications, or curricula if they are an integral part of a strategy of collective action for social change. UUAC does not fund individuals.

Each year, approximately 25 scholars are selected as Members in the School of Social Science. A completed doctorate or equivalent is required by the application deadline. Memberships are awarded at both the junior and senior levels. They are for the full academic year only unless the scholar is from a country with an academic calendar that is substantially different than the one in the U.S., in which case single-term Memberships will be considered. Scholars may be considered for a second residency if a sufficient amount of time has passed since their initial Membership. Members are expected only to pursue their own research and participate in the seminars. The theme for 2021-22 is "Political Mobilizations and Social Movements," but applications outside the theme are also welcomed. An interdisciplinary dialogue will be fostered and applications are strongly encouraged from scholars across the social sciences, whether or not their research corresponds to the theme.

The Russell Sage Foundation's program on Social Inequality supports innovative research on whether rising economic inequality has affected social, political, and economic institutions, and the extent to which increased inequality has affected equality of opportunity, social mobility, and the intergenerational transmission of advantage. We seek investigator-initiated research projects that will broaden our understanding of the causes and consequences of rising economic inequalities in the United States.

The Law & Social Sciences Program considers proposals that address social scientific studies of law and law-like systems of rules. The Program is inherently interdisciplinary and multi-methodological. Successful proposals describe research that advances scientific theory and understanding of the connections between law or legal processes and human behavior. Social scientific studies of law often approach law as dynamic, made in multiple arenas, with the participation of multiple actors. Fields of study include many disciplines, and often address problems including though not limited to:

The Bureau of International Labor Affairs (ILAB), U.S. Department of Labor announces the availability of approximately $4 million total costs for up to two cooperative agreements of up to $2 million total costs each to fund technical assistance project(s) in two different countries to improve implementation of social compliance systems that promote acceptable conditions of work and the elimination of child labor and forced labor in coffee supply chains. Each cooperative agreement will fund a project in one of the following countries in the Latin America/Caribbean region, where DOL's List of Goods Produced by Child Labor or Forced Labor (TVPRA List) documents child labor and/or forced labor concerns: Colombia, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, or Nicaragua. Project outcomes include: 1) Adoption of a robust and sustainable social compliance system by private sector stakeholders in coffee supply chains; 2) Strengthened capacity of private sector stakeholders to implement a robust and sustainable social compliance system in coffee supply chains; and 3) New social compliance tools on child labor, forced labor, and acceptable conditions of work piloted in the coffee supply chain. The duration of the project will be a maximum of 4 years (48 months) from the effective date of the award. Applicants may apply for one or two of the cooperative agreements listed above. No more than two applications per applicant will be accepted. If applying for two cooperative agreements, applicants should not combine countries in a single application, but must submit separate applications for each country. Each application should request no more than $2 million total costs in funding.

Through the council's COVID-19 Rapid-Response Grants program, innovative research projects that deploy remote research methods to shed light on both the short- and potential long-term effects of COVID-19 across a range of issues will be supported, including "social distancing" and virtual social interaction; governance and democracy; public trust and (dis)information; social inequality and the pandemic's disproportionate effects by race and ethnicity; the lessons of past disasters, and responses to them, for the present; the role of religious ideas, practices, and institutions in responding to the pandemic; the workplace and labor markets; technology, surveillance, and ethics; and the uses of, and the limits to, modeling in responses to the pandemic's effects and in scenario planning.

The Research Group "Alternatives to Democracy? The Social Order of Dictatorships" examines the question how dictatorial regimes - despite their inherent destructivity and repressive violence - create new orders of the political and the social that appeal to populations at large. The cases of pre-War Nazi Germany, the Soviet Union under Nikita Khrushchev, and Spain during the Franco era will serve as fields of inquiry to address the following questions: Which are the pre-conditions that give rise to dictatorships? When are they seen as an appealing way out of political, social, and economic disruption? How are dictatorial regimes able to generate legitimacy? What kind of stability do they create on the backdrop of crisis, insecurity, and disorder? Essential Duties & Responsibilities: We expect successful candidates to conduct extensive archival research in one of the countries under consideration. Each successful applicant will closely co-operate with the team of organizers of the Research Group: Brigit Aschmann (Chair of Modern European and Spanish History), Jörg Baberowski (Chair of Russian and Soviet History) and Michael Wildt (Chair of German History). Successful applicants are expected to write and defend a dissertation. In their research, they are asked to address and discuss conceptual questions of comparative history, including the comparison of modern dictatorial regimes.

The Social Science Research Council and the Japan Foundation Center for Global Partnership have announced that applications are now open for the Abe Fellowship for Journalists. The fellowship is designed to encourage in-depth coverage of topics of pressing concern to the United States and Japan through individual short-term policy-related projects. Applicants are invited to submit proposals on one of four themes. 1) Threats to Personal, Societal, and International Security: Topics may include food, water, and energy insecurity; pandemics; climate change; disaster preparedness, prevention, and recovery; and conflict, terrorism, and cyber security. 2) Growth and Sustainable Development: Topics may include global financial stability, trade imbalances and agreements, adjustment to globalization, climate change and adaptation, and poverty and inequality. 3) Social, Scientific, and Cultural Trends and Transformations: Topics may include aging and other demographic change, the benefits and dangers of reproductive genetics, gender and social exclusion, expansion of STEM education among women and underrepresented populations, migration, rural depopulation and urbanization, impacts of automation on jobs, poverty and inequality, and community resilience. 4) Governance, Empowerment, and Participation: Topics may include challenges to democratic institutions, participatory governance, human rights, the changing role of NGO/NPOs, the rise of new media, and government roles in fostering innovation.

The Ohio State University Libraries is partnering with the Association of American Universities (AAU), Association of Research Libraries (ARL), and the Association of University Presses (AAUP) on an Open Access digital monograph publishing initiative that will advance the wide dissemination of humanities and humanistic social science scholarship. Under this initiative, peer-reviewed and professionally edited university press humanities and humanistic social sciences monographs will be funded through partnering universities and published as Open Access digital editions, available at no cost to the public. The Ohio State University Libraries is offering subventions for scholarly monographs in the humanities and the humanistic social sciences. The Libraries will provide a baseline publishing grant of $15,000 to a participating university press to support the publication of an Open Access, digital monograph of 90,000 words or less. We have set a target of awarding three publishing grants per year and we are committed to participating in this initiative for five years.

Seed grants of up to $1,000 will be awarded to social entrepreneurs for projects in the early stages of development, including those that promote compassion for all life (people, planet, animals), environmental sustainability, justice in all its forms, community health and wellness, and social change-oriented arts and culture. Only applications for seed funding, as opposed to ongoing operational or program costs, will be accepted.

The Administration for Children and Families (ACF), Administration for Native Americans (ANA) announces the availability of Fiscal Year (FY) 2018 funds for the Social and Economic Development Strategies (SEDS) program. This program is focused on community-driven projects designed to grow local economies, strengthen Native American families, including the preservation of Native American cultures, and decrease the high rate of current challenges caused by the lack of community-based businesses, and social and economic infrastructure in Native American communities. Native American communities include American Indian tribes (federally-recognized and non-federally recognized), Native Hawaiians, Alaskan Natives, and Native American Pacific Islanders.

The European Institutes for Advanced Study (EURIAS) Fellowship Programme is an international researcher mobility programme offering 10-month residencies in one of the 16 participating Institutes: Berlin, Bologna, Brussels, Budapest, Cambridge, Delmenhorst, Freiburg, Helsinki, Jerusalem, Lyon, Marseille, Paris, Uppsala, Vienna, Wassenaar, Zürich. The Institutes for Advanced Study support the focused, self-directed work of outstanding researchers. The fellows benefit from the finest intellectual and research conditions and from the stimulating environment of a multi-disciplinary and international community of first-rate scholars. EURIAS Fellowships are mainly offered in the fields of the humanities and social sciences but may also be granted to scholars in life and exact sciences, provided that their proposed research project does not require laboratory facilities and that it interfaces with humanities and social sciences. The diversity of the 16 participating IAS offers a wide range of possible research contexts in Europe for worldwide scholars. Applicants may select up to three IAS outside their country of nationality or residence as possible host institutions. The Programme welcomes applications worldwide from promising young scholars as well as from leading senior researchers. The EURIAS selection process has proven to be highly competitive. To match the Programme standards, applicants have to submit a solid and innovative research proposal, to demonstrate the ability to forge beyond disciplinary specialisation, to show an international commitment as well as quality publications in high-impact venues. For the 2014-2015 academic year, EURIAS offers 39 fellowships (20 junior and 19 senior positions).

Deadline is April 15, 2013 for the Hanes Walton Award for Quantitative Methods Training which provides scholarships for recipients to attend the Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR) Summer Program in Quantitative Methods of Social Research at the University of Michigan. Scholarship recipients will receive a waiver of Program Scholar fees to attend the four and/or eight week ICPSR Summer Program. The scholarships are designed to encourage faculty and graduate students from Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), as well as women and minority graduate students and faculty at other institutions, to attend the Summer Program. There will be one award per category: (1) Graduate Students in PhD programs who have acquired ABD status; and (2) Tenure-Track & Non-Tenured Faculty. The National Conference of Black Political Scientists (NCOBPS) will also provide scholarship recipients with a travel stipend of up to $500.

The Fellowships for Advanced Social Science Research on Japan program is a joint activity of the Japan-U.S. Friendship Commission (JUSFC) and the National Endowment for the Humanities. Awards support research on modern Japanese society and political economy, Japan's international relations, and U.S.-Japan relations. The program encourages innovative research that puts these subjects in wider regional and global contexts and is comparative and contemporary in nature. Research should contribute to scholarly knowledge or to the general public's understanding of issues of concern to Japan and the United States.

The Battelle Memorial Institute-Ohio State partnership fosters programs that examine the complex relationship between science and technology and broader social and cultural issues. Strong emphasis is placed on educational and public service projects rather than pure research. Interdisciplinary collaborations within the university and collaborations with other institutions are especially encouraged. Projects that address engineering-related topics or feature collaborations between engineering and the social sciences or arts/humanities are particularly welcomed.