Kling Fellows, Fall 2018

The Merle Kling Undergraduate Honors Fellowship

Introduction

Every spring, five to seven of Washington University’s most promising and talented sophomore scholars are admitted into the Merle Kling Undergraduate Honors Fellowship, named in honor of one of our most influential and inspirational leaders. Potential Kling Fellows are Arts and Sciences undergraduates who seek opportunities to engage in serious independent research in the humanities and/or the humanistic social sciences, with an interest in pursuing further graduate work in one of these areas. The Kling Fellowship Program aims to introduce students to the life of the mind, to show students what it is like to do research and to excite gifted undergraduates about the possibilities of pursuing a graduate degree. They also receive a stipend for each of the four semesters they spend in the program. Yet, the benefits of the Fellowship go beyond an individual’s interests and aspirations. The Kling Fellowship creates a community of scholars who come together and engage with one another’s research across disciplines. The program promotes fellowship in its truest form: a community of motivated intellectuals, brought together to facilitate discovery and collaboration.

Application Process

To apply for the Kling Class of 2025, applicants must submit a completed application form and two short essays by March 10, with a faculty letter of recommendation due the following Monday, March 13.

Learn more & apply

About the Kling Fellowship

Every spring, five to seven of Washington University’s most promising and talented sophomore scholars are admitted into the Merle Kling Undergraduate Honors Fellowship, named in honor of one of our most influential and inspirational leaders.

Potential Kling Fellows are Arts and Sciences undergraduates who seek opportunities to engage in serious independent research in the humanities and/or the humanistic social sciences, with an interest in pursuing further graduate work in one of these areas. They apply midway through the spring semester of their sophomore year and are selected shortly after Spring Break.

Each Kling Fellow identifies a humanities-oriented research project, which often changes over time, and works with the Center for the Humanities to select a faculty mentor for guidance in his or her discipline and to request research funding. Kling Fellows meet weekly in an interdisciplinary seminar where they present drafts of their work, peer-review one another’s writing, read and think about the role of the humanities in university life, and occasionally get off campus to see humanities research in action around the St. Louis metro area. During the summers, Kling research continues, with many Fellows drawing on their research funds for everything from language study to ethnographic interviews to archival discovery. Kling Fellows are also encouraged to present their research at conferences and symposia, both on and off campus.

Over the course of two academic years, each Kling Fellow will write up his or her research findings in either a scholarly article or a long-form piece of creative nonfiction: both will be published in the annual Kling journal, Slideshow. Fellows are also encouraged to use their Kling research to get a head start on honors work in their major departments. At the same time, Kling Fellows are an important part of the Center for the Humanities, where they meet each semester’s cohort of faculty and graduate-student fellows, select an outside speaker to invite for a public lecture each year, and provide under­graduate representation on the center’s advisory board.

The Kling Fellowship Program aims to introduce students to the life of the mind, to show students what it is like to do research, and to excite gifted undergraduates about the possibilities of pursuing a graduate degree. Yet, the benefits of the Fellowship go beyond an individual’s interests and aspirations. The Kling Fellowship creates a community of scholars who come together and engage with one another’s research across disciplines. The program promotes fellowship in its truest form: a community of motivated intellectuals, brought together to facilitate discovery and collaboration.

The Merle Kling Undergraduate Honors Fellowship Program has provided these opportunities for students since 2003. Stephanie Kirk, director of the Center for the Humanities, serves as the faculty director of the Kling Fellowship. Wendy Love Anderson, the center’s assistant director of academic programs, co-teaches the seminar and administers the Kling Fellowship Program. For more information about the application process, visit the Kling Application Process page or contact Dr. Anderson at (314) 935-9523 or andersonwl@wustl.edu.

Learn more about the fellowship program’s namesake, a longtime member of the Washington University community, by following this link.

Slideshow: The Kling Fellowship Journal

The Center for the Humanities prides itself on creating research opportunities not only for faculty and graduate students but for undergraduates as well. Through the Merle Kling Undergraduate Honors Fellowship, the center supports exceptional WU undergraduate students for two years of sustained humanities research under faculty mentorship. At the end of the two-year Kling Fellowship, the center then provides an opportunity for these students to publish their research through the Kling Fellowship journal Slideshow. Many Kling Fellows also publish longer and more extensive versions of their research as a senior honors thesis.

Read current and past issues of Slideshow
Kling Fellow Erica Williams doing summer research

Kling Fellowship Details & Timeline

The Merle Kling Undergraduate Honors Fellowship is a two-year research program that is housed in and administered by the Center for the Humanities. Between five and seven Arts and Sciences sophomores are selected each spring to pursue independent research projects of their choosing in the humanities or humanistic social sciences. Fellows receive guidance through faculty mentorship and participation in a weekly research seminar throughout their junior and senior years. In addition, Fellows conduct independent research each summer and work together to publish an annual newsletter, invite speakers to campus, and participate in campus-wide undergraduate research events. Each Fellow will receive $4000 in research funding over the course of the two-year fellowship (normally $500/semester). The program culminates with the publication of the senior Fellows’ final papers in the Kling research journal, Slideshow.

Weekly Seminar

A three-credit, writing-intensive Kling Fellowship seminar (L56 CFH 400W) meets once a week throughout the academic year and is required for all junior and senior Kling Fellows on campus (second-semester juniors may elect to study abroad). Stephanie Kirk, the center’s director, and Wendy Love Anderson, the assistant director of academic programs, typically co-teach this class and direct discussion of the Fellows' research goals, papers, and argument structure. Fellows engage the work of their peers through presentations and peer review, discuss the status of the humanities in public life, and the potential advantages and drawbacks of graduate study, and engage with the center’s faculty and graduate-student fellows in discussions about research methods and careers in the humanities.

Mentor Partnership

To provide subject expertise and discipline-specific advice on the wide range of topics pursued by Kling Fellows, each Fellow works closely with a WU faculty mentor (typically but not always in the Fellow’s major department) throughout the two-year program to plan and carry out a mutually agreeable research project. A few Fellows with highly interdisciplinary programs wind up with two faculty mentors; a few Fellows whose projects shift significantly will also wind up changing mentors as a result. In all cases, however, the Kling Fellowship seeks to actively engage its Fellows and their mentors in a successful research partnership. During the academic year and the summer, mentors and Fellows communicate regularly to discuss research progress, challenges, and ideas. Mentor approval is also required for Kling Fellows to apply for research funding. In this way, Fellows learn from their faculty mentors, get advice, evaluate their own progress, and experience what working with a mentor in graduate school is like.

Summer Research

Fellows must submit monthly updates on their research progress to their mentors and program faculty during each of their two summers in the program. Many Fellows use their summers for intensive language study, fieldwork, or archival research. Fellows often save part of their Kling stipends for summer research expenses, but they are also encouraged to apply for funds from their major departments/programs and from the Office of Undergraduate Research.

Engagement

During their two years, Kling Fellows engage with the Washington University and St. Louis community in a variety of ways. Every semester, Fellows go on an outing to one or more public humanities sites around the city, such as the George B. Vashon Museum or the Museum at the Gateway Arch. Some Fellowship cohorts also plan their own public humanities events or sites; all participate in the Center for the Humanities' major public-facing events. Finally, the culmination of the Kling Fellowship Program is the publication of each Fellow’s work in the journal Slideshow. Just before the seniors are sent off, a dinner is held in their honor, attended by Fellowship coordinators, mentors and three generations of Kling Fellows.

Fellowship Timeline

Here’s what your time as a Kling Fellow might look like:

  • Spring Semester, Sophomore Year – Beginning after Spring Break, the newly admitted Kling sophomores will attend a weekly orientation seminar, sometimes meeting together with junior and senior Kling Fellows and sometimes meeting separately. Sophomores should also finalize their choice of faculty mentor and begin meeting regularly with him or her. The major responsibility of this semester is for each student to identify and articulate summer research goals.
  • Summer after Sophomore Year – Rising junior Kling Fellows will conduct independent research, sending monthly updates to both their faculty mentor and the Kling program leaders. Language study and intensive immersion in existing scholarship are typical goals for the first summer of the Kling program. Some entering Kling Fellows also hold summer internships or jobs.
  • Fall Semester, Junior Year – Become a full-fledged Kling Fellow! Junior Kling Fellows will attend weekly seminar meetings, learn about humanities research and careers, and expand on their summer research. They will workshop other Fellows' research papers and refine their own proposals, including a literature review. They will learn how to present their research in everything from one-minute elevator speeches to ten- or fifteen-minute formal talks. Occasionally, Kling juniors study abroad in the fall semester, in which case they do most of the work on their proposals in the spring semester.
  • Spring Semester, Junior Year – Some juniors will study abroad this semester, submitting periodic updates on their Kling research progress. (A few juniors opt to study abroad in the fall instead.) The remaining juniors will continue with the seminar, writing either an expanded proposal, a separate short research paper (such as a survey of their project's historical background), or both. They may participate in organizing a public humanities project in collaboration with the Center for the Humanities. They will also help welcome incoming sophomores and bid farewell to outgoing seniors.
  • Summer after Junior Year – Rising senior Kling Fellows will often conduct the bulk of their original research in this summer, whether that research involves ethnographic interviews, textual analysis, archival immersion, or another form of research. They will send monthly updates and otherwise remain in contact with their faculty mentor and Kling program leaders.
  • Fall Semester, Senior Year – Senior Kling Fellows will continue to attend weekly seminar meetings, giving and receiving peer feedback on written work and presentations, and ending the semester with a complete (but not final) draft of an article for Slideshow. Seniors are also encouraged to draw on their Kling research for honors thesis work in their major department or program, and most Kling seniors do so. (By this point in the Kling Fellowship program, most seniors have “too much” research to fit in a single article anyway!)
  • Spring Semester, Senior Year – Kling seniors must submit their Slideshow articles before Spring Break and respond to a variety of edits and revision suggestions during March and early April. One senior will serve as Slideshow’s student editor, writing an editor’s note and making decisions about journal layout and presentation together with the Kling program leaders. At the end of the semester, all Kling seniors will formally present their research, sometimes in conjunction with the spring Undergraduate Research Symposium or with other research cohort programs. We end each academic year with a Kling Senior Dinner, where three years of Kling Fellows and their mentors come together to celebrate the Fellowship.

Contact Us

For additional information about the Kling Fellowship Program or the Kling application process, please feel free to reach out to:

Wendy Love Anderson

Assistant Director of Academic Programs, Center for the Humanities
Academic Coordinator for the Kling Fellowship Program
(314) 935-9523
andersonwl@wustl.edu