Collaborative Research Projects, Events, and Conferences

Eligibility

Tenure-track faculty, from all three University of Washington campuses, may apply in the roles of principal investigator. We encourage small teams of faculty -- usually two to three -- representing different departments, disciplines, and/or fields of expertise in the humanities and humanistic social sciences to lead collaborative research projects, events, and conferences. Teaching-track faculty, graduate students, lecturers, staff, community members, and others are welcome to participate in these projects, events, and conferences but may not lead them.

Scope and Fundable Activities

Too often, humanities scholarship is a solo enterprise. The Simpson Center believes that strengthening the humanities' future partly depends on making collaboration more common place on our campus and beyond.

Funding for collaborative research projects, events, and conferences is intended to seed innovative scholarship by bringing together people from different departments, disciplines, fields of expertise, and organizations who share common research interests.

This new category of funding combines two previous categories: "crossdisciplinary research clusters" and "colloquia and conferences." This reimagined category continues to offer support for external scholars and speakers but places fresh emphasis on building local intellectual communities and undertaking collaborative research with UW colleagues that will produce tangible and significant outcomes such as co-authored publications and other forms of joint presentation such as public exhibitions, videos, podcasts, and website and database projects. 

Topics should be of interest to scholars across two or more disciplines and speak to concerns that resonate across the humanities. Student involvement with projects is also valued such as through faculty teaching microseminars for graduate students or arranging for external scholars to visit undergraduate classes.

Projects in this category may vary widely in form and scale. Funding may be requested for one or more of these five types of activity. Because summer support (1) and working conferences (2) require significant financial resources and tangible outcomes, however, applicants may only request support from one  of the first two types of activities among other possible requests for types (3), (4), and (5).

1. Summer Research, Writing, and Creative Support ($5,000 per person for up to three principal investigators for a maximum of $15,000; collaborations of more than three principal investigators may also only receive a maximum total of $15,000). This support allows tenure-track faculty to undertake collaborative research, writing, and creative work during summer months with the goal of producing a tangible and substantive outcome such as a co-authored article or book chapter, or a co-curated public exhibition. Funds may be used in one or two of the following three ways:
   1. to pay summer salary to principal investigators (paid during late June 2027)
   2. to provide research funds to principal investigators (for research expenses during fiscal years 2026-27 and 2027-28)
   3. to hire an hourly graduate research assistant (for work during summer 2026)
2. Working Conferences. Working conferences may involve external presenters and must involve some UW presenters. Working conferences usually take place over one to three days, and may involve more public-facing events such as keynote lectures and panels. Principal investigators should have the goal of producing a tangible and substantive outcome such as an edited volume, journal special issue, or website or database project focused on a particular research theme or area of study. Budget requests of up to $20,000 will be considered for working conferences.
3. Intellectual Community-Building Events for those on Campus and Nearby. The aim of these less formal events is to draw local faculty, lecturers, students, staff, community members, and others into intellectual conversation and community around a particular research theme or area of study. Examples of such events include a meet-and-greet which gathers people for a reception, announcements, and mingling; a panel where presenters speak to a common theme or issue; or a seminar series where people share their work or discuss pre-circulated works-in-progress. Generally, these events do not involve participants who require travel support and/or honoraria. We expect budget requests for this type of activity not to exceed $3,000.
4. Lecture Series. A lecture series entails a more formal set of presentations, usually open to the public, where UW and/or external speakers share their research. Although people employed at UW may not receive honoraria, the Simpson Center can provide $500 in research funds to UW faculty who give presentations in a Simpson-supported lecture series. Lecture series may involve up to three speakers and up to two of them may be external. Expenses for external speakers are budgeted at $3,900 for those travelling within the United States and $5,300 for those travelling internationally.
5. Microseminars. These are graduate seminars, usually taught or co-taught by principal investigators, meant to foster crossdisciplinary conversations. They generally meet three to four times in a single quarter and have a more modest reading load than regular graduate courses in the humanities and few, if any, written assignments. They are typically one-credit, credit/no credit. Microseminars are frequently structured around the work of an external speaker, allowing students to grow familiar with a speaker’s work in advance of their visit to campus. Faculty receive $1,500 in research funds for teaching microseminars; when co-taught, these funds are divided equally among the faculty instructors. 

As Simpson Center staff have a finite capacity to organize events and arrange travel and accommodation, the Simpson Executive Board, when determining which proposals to fund, will consider staffing requirements for the proposed events alongside the quality of proposals and the appropriateness of budget requests. If staff support can be provided by other units, applicants should indicate that in their proposals.

If you envision collaborative research projects and events that do not appear to fit into the five types of activities described above, please consult with the Simpson Center before drafting and submitting your proposal. We are interested to hear your ideas and discuss how they might be supported. To request a meeting, contact Rachel Arteaga at rarteaga@uw.edu.

To develop your budget, please consult this guide and Simpson Administrator Julie Tarr-Stoverink at scfiscal@uw.edu. She can assist in building your budget.

Terms of Award

Awards of financial and staff support vary according to requests and needs. The maximum total financial request for each collaborative research projects and events application is $25,000. 

In the spirit of learning from one another and strengthening a culture of conversation across the humanities at UW, spring 2026 awardees will be required to give brief presentations on their projects and events at a research collaboration and co-teaching "showcase" in October 2027. Presenters will share outcomes, lessons learned from the process of collaboration, and discuss how they might do things differently next time. The showcase will be open to the public and attended by Simpson Center Executive Board members.

Evaluation Criteria

Collaborative research projects, events, and conference applications will be evaluated according to the following five criteria:

1. The intellectual significance of the project, events, and planned outcomes, including their potential contribution to the humanities; the likelihood that they will stimulate work in a new direction or productive area; their relationship to larger themes or issues in the humanities; and the significance of the material on which the project is based.

2. The commitment to crossdisciplinary collaboration, including the project’s and events’ potential to bring people from different disciplines, departments, and fields of expertise on campus related to the topic into conversation in ways that produce impacts and outcomes that are more than the sum of their parts.

3. The potential impact on our campus community (and if appropriate, beyond), and the value and appropriateness of the described project outcomes.

4. The qualifications, expertise, and level of commitment of the principal researchers/organizers and others involved.

5. The clarity and feasibility of the work plan and budget, including the likelihood that the proposed goals will be successfully completed within the projected time frame, the appropriateness of budget requests, the adequacy of explanations for those requests, and the sufficiency of the discussion of any additional sources of financial and staffing support from home departments and other relevant programs and units on campus.

Meeting Before Applying

We recommend that all those applying for collaborative research projects, events, and conferences consult with the Simpson Center in advance of the application deadline. To request a meeting, please contact Rachel Arteaga at rarteaga@uw.edu.