Tag: University of Cambridge

CFP U Cambridge: Translating Conflict and Refuge (UK)

ConferencesCall for papers: Translating Conflict and Refuge: Language, Displacement, and the Politics of Representation, University of Cambridge, England, 24 April 2026. Submission deadline: 5 December 2025.

Linguistic barriers exacerbate the already formidable challenges of responding to humanitarian crises, particularly—but not exclusively—in conflict zones. In the past decade alone armed conflicts worldwide have inflicted untold suffering on large populations and often resulted in mass displacement. Addressing the needs of those affected by war and violence necessitates the involvement of large numbers of translators and interpreters, many of whom are frequently untrained volunteers. In addition to the immediate crisis response, people with, or seeking, refugee and/or asylum seeker status require sustained access to translation and interpreting support in host countries, both in order to access basic services and to enable their integration into local communities.

This event will bring together translators, interpreters, scholars, NGO representatives, and volunteers to develop a deeper understanding of the complex demands and realities involved in translating conflict and refuge. The aim is to create a space for meaningful exchange as well as to generate concrete opportunities for collaboration.

U Cambridge: Junior Research Fellowship (UK)

Fellowships

Stipendiary Junior Research Fellowship, Christ’s College, University of Cambridge, UK. Deadline: 16 September 2025.

The College invites applications for a 4 year stipendiary Junior Research Fellowship in specified areas of the Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences. It will be tenable for four years from normally no later than 1 October 2026 and is not renewable.

A Junior Research Fellowship is intended for a researcher early in their career and, in this case, is restricted to applicants in one or more of the following subject areas:

  • Classics
  • History (c. 700–c. 1450)
  • Music
  • Politics & International Studies

The Junior Research Fellowship offers an opportunity to carry out novel research in a stimulating academic environment. A successful applicant is expected to be either a postgraduate student, probably in the latter stages of research leading to a PhD degree (or equivalent), or a post-doctoral researcher who has completed their PhD Degree after 1 January 2025.

U Cambridge: PhD Studentship: Colombo: Layered Histories in the Global South City (UK)

“Studentships“Ph.D. Studentship: Colombo: Layered Histories in the Global South City Studentship, University of Cambridge, England, UK. Deadline: 31 August 2025.

The UKRI-funded 5-year project, ‘Colombo: Layered Histories in the Global South City’, selected for funding by the European Research Council under its ‘HORIZON’ programme, is recruiting to its doctoral studentship. This is a fully funded full-time international studentship for three years, commencing January 2026. The prospective doctoral student will focus their attention within the broad field of the ‘Environmental and/or cultural history of Colombo’, ideally in the early modern or modern era. Given the project’s aim to generate dialogue between Sri Lanka and Europe, candidates applying from Sri Lanka are especially encouraged.

Colombo has a deeply layered imperial past. It came under a succession of European empires, Portuguese (first trading post in 1518), Dutch (1656-1796) and British (1796-1948). It was also pivotal to the early globalisation of Islam and has housed a series of diasporic and minority communities. This project interrogates how invaders and residents made a city in an unstable environment at the centre of the Indian Ocean, in which arose a diverse society, generating an abundance of cultural production and a sequence of violent politics. The four pathways of research are as follows:

  • In environmental terms, this multiply-colonised and repeatedly-engineered city is built in a wetland without a significant natural harbour;

  • In social terms, in a heavily nationalised state, the city has resisted indigeneity, as it is inhabited by many minority communities with long narrations of origin;

  • As for culture, Colombo was represented in keeping with recurrent motifs, as a site of transit across the Indian Ocean, including for enslaved and indentured labour as well as settlers;

  • And on politics, the heavy work needed, at the bridge of sea and land set one context for the rise of urban violence between communities in the midst of civil war in addition to sustained strikes and new political movements.

    At its broadest perspective, the project aims to develop resources with which to consider the pasts, presents and futures of this global South city as located within the remit of other global South cities elsewhere.

The doctoral candidate’s work on this project will fall under themes 2) environment and/or 4) culture. This five-year project is led by Professor Sujit Sivasundaram. The successful applicant will join a team of researchers, including postdoctoral fellows and an existing doctoral student. Their research will contribute to a wider collaborative project.

The doctoral studentship will pay full tuition fees at the University of Cambridge over three years. It also provides a maintenance allowance of £20,780 per year and a budget for training and research.

This studentship is only open to international applicants (excluding UK, including EU and EEA). Candidates applying from Sri Lanka are especially encouraged given the grant’s formal aim to generate dialogue on these research questions between Sri Lanka and Europe. Preference will be given to candidates demonstrating competence in both Sinhala and Tamil, with competence in one of these language for research purposes being an essential requirement for the successful candidate.

CFP U Cambridge: Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Empire, Colonialism, & Anticolonialism (UK)

ConferencesCall for papers: Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Empire, Colonialism, and Anticolonialism, University of Cambridge, England, 17 October 2025. Deadline: 30 August 2025.

Empire, colonialism, and anticolonialism have been central drivers of world history for the past centuries, and they continue to shape present day realities. From ongoing practices of settler colonialism, through to climate colonialism, economic imperialism, and resurgent far-right nationalisms drawing upon imageries of empire, it seems to be obvious that ‘empire’ and ‘colonialism’ have never gone away. At the same time, we are in a moment of history where we are also witnessing a proliferation of resistance against empire and colonialism: from the halls of universities (as seen in the Palestine encampments) through to frontline battles against settlers, militarized violence, and nefarious capital.

Different disciplines across the arts, humanities, and social sciences have highlighted different dimensions of these processes of colonialism and anti-colonialism. At this one-day conference, organizers hope to put these different disciplines in conversation with one another, taking the strongest tools from different disciplines, such that they can produce a truly interdisciplinary understanding of empire, colonialism, anti-colonialism, and decolonization.

With this in mind, they are issuing this call for papers for presenters from across the arts, humanities, and social sciences, open to presenters at all career stages. Expressions of interest in all areas related to empire, colonialism, anti-colonialism, and decolonization are welcome, including (but not limited to):
• Historical and comparative accounts of empire, colonialism, anti-colonialism, and decolonization.
•    Tracing material forms of resistance to empire.
• Conceptual and empirical work highlighting the importance of anticolonial thought and practice.
•  Considerations of the role of universities (and education broadly) in anti/colonialism and decolonization.
•  Tracing links between the social, political, cultural, and economic organisations of metropoles and colonies.
• Provocations and discussions of ongoing practices of colonization / anti-colonialism.

U Cambridge: Early Career Research Fellowship (UK)

FellowshipsEarly Career Research Fellowship, University of Cambridge, UK. Deadline: 3 September 2025.

Corpus Christi College, Cambridge (UK) invites applications for one Early-Career Research Fellowship tenable for four years from 1 October 2026. Eligible applicants are expected to be at an early stage of their career (and may not yet have completed their doctoral work). If postdoctoral, “early career” is defined as being within two years from the date of a successful viva voce examination at the time of application (that is noon on Wednesday 3 September 2025). Early-Career Research Fellows are normally expected to be resident in Cambridge for the term of their Fellowship.

This year applications will be considered in the following subjects: Modern and Medieval Languages;
Classics; Linguistics; Asian and Middle Eastern Studies.

U Cambridge: Senior Research Associate for Cambridge Positive Peace Education Hub (UK)

“Job
Senior Research Associate, Cambridge Positive Peace Education (CPPE) Hub, University of Cambridge, UK. Deadline: 1 June 2025.

The University of Cambridge Faculty of Education is seeking a highly motivated and experienced Senior Research Associate (SRA) to lead key aspects of the new Cambridge Positive Peace Education (CPPE) Hub. At a time of rising global conflict, the CPPE Hub aims to make a significant contribution to knowledge and practice in the field of peace education. It will do so by building upon Professor Hilary Cremin’s Positive Peace Education Learning Objectives and two recent positive peace education projects in Kazakhstan and the UK. The CPPE Hub will enhance and scale-up this work by conducting a global peace education needs assessment, implementing case studies in two countries, and developing peace educator and education leader networks.

The findings from this research will be used to create a Positive Peace Education Framework and Curriculum, including a suite of resources to support peace education integration into classrooms, school districts, and national curricula. The collective work of the project will be shared on an interactive digital platform, the CPPE Digital Hub, that will serve as a lasting legacy of the project and help maximise its global reach.

In alignment with the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and UNESCO’s recent call to prioritise peace in education, this project will conduct needed research, bring key global peace education actors into dialogue and collaboration with one another, and make impactful peace education resources more accessible ¿ leading to an array of positive impacts for learners, their communities, countries, and the planet.

CRASSH: Fellowships for Scholars from the Global South 2026 (UK)

FellowshipsScience, Politics and Justice Visiting Fellowships for Scholars from the Global South: Science, Politics and Justice, CRASSH, University of Cambridge, UK. Deadline: 24 February 2025.

The Centre for Research in the Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences (CRASSH) at the University of Cambridge is inviting applications for funded Visiting Fellowships for scholars from the Global South. The purpose of these Fellowships is to provide opportunities for scholars working at higher education institutions in the Global South to exchange ideas with other researchers based at CRASSH and elsewhere in the University of Cambridge and to draw benefit from access to the University’s collections and resources. It is hoped that these visits will lead on to future collaborations and exchanges.

For 2026, CRASSH will partner with the Department of History and Philosophy of Science. Applications are invited from scholars whose research is connected to the theme of science, politics and justice. This invites projects that study the ethics, politics and history of scientific, medical and technical knowledge-making and the multiple ways in which science has been leveraged by various groups in pursuit of justice. This may include proposals that focus on the participation of scientific and medical experts and activists in projects of anticolonialism, antiracism, climate and environmental justice, disarmament, gender equity, indigenous rights, reproductive rights, the repatriation of heritage and ancestors, or scientific and medical literacy. The call also welcomes projects that examine moral, ethical, and historical questions of science and engineering as contributors to crime prevention, policing, prosecution, and war. Equally, it includes projects that investigate the moral responsibility of scientific experts, as well as objectivity, neutrality, and value judgements in socially engaged science.

They invite applications from any discipline, including anthropology, archaeology, art history, digital humanities, ecology and environmental studies, history, philosophy, medical humanities, museum studies, science and technology studies, and sociology. Projects should aim to advance current understandings of science, politics, and justice through concrete case studies of science in action.

All Fellows selected under this scheme will be asked to work together to design an event related to the theme of this call, to take place during the term they are resident in Cambridge, and to present their own research at this event. This event will be co-hosted by CRASSH and the Department of History and Philosophy of Science. Fellows will also be invited to give a separate presentation on their research, if they wish, at the Department of History and Philosophy of Science.

CRASSH: Fellowships for Scholars from the Global South 2024-5 (UK)

FellowshipsVisiting Fellowships for Scholars from the Global South: Religious Boundaries, CRASSH, University of Cambridge, UK. Deadline: 25 February 2024.

The Centre for Research in the Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences (CRASSH) at the University of Cambridge is inviting applications for funded Visiting Fellowships for scholars from the Global South. The purpose of these Fellowships is to provide opportunities for scholars working at higher education institutions in the Global South to exchange ideas with other researchers based at CRASSH and elsewhere in the University of Cambridge and to draw benefit from access to the University’s collections and resources. It is hoped that these visits will lead on to future collaborations and exchanges.

For 2025, CRASSH will partner with the Faculty of Divinity and the Cambridge Interfaith Programme. Applications are invited from scholars whose research is connected to the theme of inter-religious relations, with a particular focus on religious boundary-making. This invites projects that study how two or more religious groups form one another in their mutual encounter, when and how they demarcate difference, and how boundaries between them remain mutable through various activities of exchange such as dialogue or missionary endeavours. The call also welcomes projects that are interested in how religious boundary-constructions relate to other articulations of identity, such as ethnicity, class, politics, or gender.

They invite applications from any discipline, including anthropology, history, philosophy, political science, sociology and theology. Projects should aim to advance current understandings of interfaith conflict and dialogue through concrete case studies of religious boundary-making or ideas about them, situated in the Global South.

There are other visiting fellowships possible at CRASSH, but they must be self-funded.

U Cambridge: Global History Programme Coordinator (UK)

“Job
Programme Coordinator, Global History Lab, Centre for Research in the Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities, University of Cambridge, UK. Deadline: 30 July 2023.

The Centre for Research in the Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities (CRASSH) invites applications for a Programme Coordinator to support a new Global History Lab (GHL) at the University of Cambridge. GHL is a platform for learning, skill development and collaboration in the creation of new narratives across global divides. Using cutting-edge technologies, innovative pedagogical practices and training in oral history methods, the GHL educates students about the history of globalisation and prepares them to become knowledge producers for a wider world. The program enlists universities and NGOs to engage in a new model of global education through peer-to-peer exchanges. It pushes the study and application of history into new humanitarian frontiers by integrating displaced peoples and refugees into its network. It promotes human capabilities of understanding by developing narrative voices and listening skills between strangers. The GHL is committed to the pursuit of the production of knowledge about the global past globally – in a way that is innovative, economical and reaches across the world’s fractures.

The Programme Coordinator role is central to the activities within GHL by managing all the parts of the activities in collaboration with the course administrator in Cambridge Online Education, and will be part of a friendly and supportive team of administrators based in CRASSH.

CRASSH: Events & Initiatives Funding 2023/24

GrantsEvents and initiatives funding for 2023/24, CRASSH, University of Cambridge, UK. Deadline: 15 October 2023.

Are you looking to hold an event or run an initiative between April and September 2024? CRASSH would like to invite you to apply for support and be part of their rich and diverse events and initiatives programme. CRASSH offers support to postgraduate students, postdocs, and academic staff employed by the University of Cambridge or one of its Colleges to run a wide range of events, workshops, and creative initiatives. They invite applications for funding and logistical support for any activity that will foster the exchange of ideas across disciplines and cultures, forge new collaborations between researchers and other participants, bring academic research to wider publics, or explore the connections between research and artistic practice.

Creative initiatives should be connected in some way to Cambridge (the city or the University) or to produce material that can be hosted on CRASSH’s website for public viewing or interaction. You may apply for support to create a film, an exhibition, a performance, a guided walk, activities that make use of the University’s collections, a hands-on workshop, or anything else that you think will fulfill the objectives above.

Funding of up to £1000 is available for one-day events, £2000 for two-day events, and £1000 for other kinds of initiative. In-kind logistical support will be provided in the form of assistance with the planning and running of events, administration, and publicity. Events and initiatives will be selected for support by a cross-School panel. Successful proposals will form part of CRASSH’s rich and diverse programme for 2023-2024.