Stuart L. Bernath Lecture Prize

This year’s Bernath Lecture committee (Paul Chamberlin, Thomas Field, and Kelly Shannon) has selected Professor Amanda Demmer of Virginia Tech University to receive the 2025 Stuart L. Bernath Lecture Prize. An award-winning scholar and teacher, Professor Demmer’s two major research projects highlight some of the most exciting new developments in foreign relations history. Her 2022 book, After Saigon's Fall, has been widely acclaimed as one of the best recent examples of how to cross analyze histories diplomacy and migration. Meanwhile, her current project on Ginetta Sagan demonstrates Demmer's sustained interest in the diplomatic agency of nonstate actors while further historicizing our understanding of the contested realm of international human rights. Her work promises to shed a clarifying light on how developments in the 1970s came to define our times. Furthermore, she is a rising star who is sure to point the way for the next generation of foreign relations historians.

The Department of History at the University of Georgia invites applications for a tenure-track open rank position in Applied History with an anticipated start date of August 1, 2025. Applicants must have their Ph.D. in History or a related field conferred by July 30, 2025. To be eligible for tenure upon appointment, candidates must be appointed as an associate or full professor, have been tenured at a prior institution, and bring a demonstrably national reputation to the institution. Candidates must be approved for tenure upon appointment before hire. For information about rank requirements visit https://provost.uga.edu/faculty-affairs/promotiontenure-evaluation/promotion-and-tenure/promotion-guidelines/ or https://provost.uga.edu/wpcontent/uploads/ptu-criteria-history.pdf

The successful candidate will have a documented record of scholarship and teaching on public policy issues (either foreign policy or domestic policy) relevant to the contemporary United States. Policy expertise could be as diverse as constitution and law, elections and voting, foreign relations, humanitarianism and human rights, war and national security, policing and incarceration, environmental issues, taxation and regulation, immigration and refugees, disease and public health, computing and artificial intelligence, or other policy areas. The successful candidate will develop course offerings in Applied History, including “Introduction to Applied History,” and direct the new Applied History Certificate program, which trains students to use historical analysis in contemporary public policy and decision-making. (For more information about Applied History, see the description here.) Requirements include teaching undergraduate and graduate courses (two in each semester); mentoring and advising students; and maintaining an active scholarly research and publishing agenda. The successful candidate will also participate in activities related to the academic mission of the department and the university, including service on committees and recruitment.

The Linda Hall Library is now accepting applications for our 2025-26 fellowship program. These fellowships provide graduate students, postdoctoral researchers, and independent scholars in the history of science and related humanities fields with financial support to explore the Library’s outstanding science and engineering collections. Fellows also participate in a dynamic intellectual community alongside in-house experts and scholars from other Kansas City cultural and educational institutions.

The Linda Hall Library holds nearly half a million monographs and more than 43,000 journal titles documenting the history of science and technology from the 15th century to the present. Its collections are exceptionally strong in the engineering disciplines, chemistry, and physics. In addition, the Library boasts extensive resources related to natural history, astronomy, earth science, environmental studies, aeronautics, life science, infrastructure studies, mathematics, and the history of the book.

The William L. Clements Library at the University of Michigan welcomes applications for 2025-2026 research fellowships. The Clements’ holdings–books, manuscripts, pamphlets, maps, prints and views, newspapers, and ephemera– are among the best in the world on almost any aspect of the American experience from 1492 through 1900, and support a diverse array of research projects.

In addition to the existing slate of fellowship opportunities, the Clements is also delighted to introduce a new fellowship this year, provided in partnership with McBride Rare Books. The McBride Rare Books Fellowship supports projects in the study of bibliography, book history, and print culture in North America before 1900. Doctoral candidates, librarians and curators, independent scholars, and faculty are eligible to apply.

CFA- “Writing the History of U.S. Foreign Relations in an Age of Crisis”
SHAFR Summer Institute

The National Archives wants your feedback on Archives.gov!

The National Archives is preparing to redesign the Archives.gov website, and wants to learn about the experiences that SHAFR members have had with the website.  Focus groups and usability testing interviews will be scheduled in the months ahead, and volunteers are sought for participation.   All feedback is welcomed, including details on any challenges that users may encounter while exploring Archives.gov, as well as suggestions for improvements.  Please consider filling out the Focus Group and Feedback Volunteer Form if you are interested in participating.  We encourage your submissions by November 30, 2024.  

Belfer Center Ernest May Fellowship in History and Policy.

The National Archives is the nation’s record keeper. We are an independent government agency responsible for preserving, protecting, and sharing the records of the United States without partisanship or ideology. To be successful, it is imperative that the National Archives welcomes—and feels welcoming to—all Americans.