The Bard Graduate Center and the American Museum of Natural History announce a Research Fellowship in Museum Anthropology. The fellowship provides support to a postdoctoral investigator to carry out a specific project over a two-year period. The program is designed to advance the training of the participant by having her/him pursue a project in association with a curator in the Division of Anthropology at the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH). The Fellow will also be expected to teach one graduate-level course per year at the Bard Graduate Center (BGC). The Fellow will thus be in joint residence at BGC and AMNH. The fellowship includes free housing.

A major purpose of the BGC-AMNH Research Fellowship in Museum Anthropology is to promote mutual scholarly interest and interaction among fellows, BGC faculty and students, and AMNH staff members. Candidates for Research Fellow are judged primarily on their research abilities and experience, and on the merits and scope of the proposed research.

Candidates with a research interest in the ethnology of the Northwest Coast of North America are especially encouraged to apply for the 2008-10 fellowship. The successful candidate will have the opportunity to develop a research program in conjunction with the planned renovation of the AMNH Northwest Coast Hall. The AMNH Northwest Coast Hall is the largest, most important collection of 19th and early 20th century Native North American Northwest Coast material culture, including art, in the world. The hall remains the primary monument to Franz Boas' revolutionary argument for cultural relativism, wherein the explanation of culture is held to be explicable only within its own contexts - social, geographical, and historical.

Application Procedures: Interested researchers should send a statement of research accomplishments and intentions, curriculum vitae including list of publications, and three letters of recommendation to Research Fellowship Competition, Bard Graduate Center, 18 W.86th Street, New York NY 10024, USA. Research Fellowship applications must be postmarked by November 15, 2007. At this time, applications are not accepted by fax or e-mail.