Independent scholars from within Europe are eligible to apply, and they will normally not hold an appointment, temporary or permanent, at an institution of higher education and research.
Applications will be considered from those who hold part-time posts within academia and seek support for research carried out outside of their contracted hours. The awards are intended as providing a stipend to allow applicants full or partial relief from non-academic duties for a period of (up to) one year; applications may be made by those whose sole or principal post is a part-time equivalent. The awards are not intended to support newly qualified scholars entering the post-doctoral stage.
Normally applicants will hold a PhD. Other academic or professional qualifications may be considered, along with publications usually in peer-reviewed academic journals. Monographs, professional journals and the popular media may also be considered.
For the purposes of this competition, an ‘Independent Scholar’ is understood as someone, whether or not currently in employment, who is engaged on intellectual work of a nature and standard comparable to that of a professional academic.
The research proposed may include, but is not confined to: initiation of a project or of research level work intended to draw on or contribute to one of the professions, completion of a project, or preparation of an article or monograph for publication, based on existing work.
The amount of an award depends on the nature of the work proposed and individual circumstances – the ISRF expects applications for grants up to a maximum of £28,750 (from January 2021). Within that sum, reasonable support for research expenses will be considered. Reasonable childcare or other domestic costs may be considered.
ISRF Independent Scholar Fellowship competitions generally launch in July each year, with a mid-August deadline for applications.
In August 2019, the ISRF launched its sixth Independent Scholar Fellowship competition. Having received a number of strong proposals, the Selection Panel met in December 2019, and voted to make three awards.
Refugee Governance from Below: Kurdish Diaspora Associations and the Incorporation of Newly-Arrived Refugees in Europe
Negative Capabilities: Rethinking the Phenomenal and Relational Aspects of the Therapeutic Encounter
Postcolonial Republicanism: The Indian Founding and its Impact
In July 2018, the ISRF launched its fifth Independent Scholar Fellowship competition. Having received a number of strong proposals, the Selection Panel met in December 2018, and voted to make four awards.
Ethnicity, Conflict and Festivalisation of Politics in Ethiopia
Overlapping Waves of Migration in the Aegean: Contextualizing a Hundred Years of Disconcerted Displacement with an Interdisciplinary, Comparative, and Ethnographic Approach
The Poetry of Science: Restoring the Role of Imagination in Mathematical Modelling
Reflections, Lessons and Directions: Race Relations, Class and Politics in a Northern English Town
In July 2017, the ISRF launched its fourth Independent Scholar Fellowship competition. Having received a number of strong proposals, the Selection Panel met in December 2017, and voted to make three awards.
A Visual Archaeology of Genocide and Slow Violence in Myanmar
Graffiti and Street Art as a Phenomenon and Consequence of Urban Crisis: the Case of Athens
What and Whose Justice in the Bioeconomy?
In July 2015, the ISRF launched its third Independent Scholar Fellowship competition. Having received a number of strong proposals, the Selection Panel met in December 2015, and voted to make three awards.
Dead Cities: Urban Ruins and the Imagination of Disaster
Producing the Victim. The Paradoxes of Intimate Violence Narratives on Trial in Italy
Between Planetary Urbanization and Thinking Forests, or, Ikiam University and its Living Laboratory – a Study of Socio-Ecological Change in the Ecuadorian Amazon
In July 2014, the ISRF launched its second Independent Scholar Fellowship competition. Having received a number of strong proposals, the Selection Panel met in December 2014, and voted to make two awards.
Banking on Democratic Television: Co-Producing Culture to Promote Public Praxis
(In)visible Entrepreneurs: How Young People Use the Urban Music Economy to Create Work and Generate Wealth
In August 2013, the ISRF launched its first Independent Scholar Fellowship competition. Having received a number of strong proposals, the Selection Panel met in September 2013, and voted to make two awards.
Coming to Terms: Mental Hygiene in Contemporary Serbia
Genomics and Knowledge Management in Innovation Systems for LDC Agriculture
If you would like to contact any of our Fellows to discuss their ISRF-funded work, please contact Dr Lars Cornelissen (Academic Editor) in the first instance, at lars.cornelissen@isrf.org.