Mellon Postdoctoral Fellowship in Modeling Interdisciplinary Inquiry

The Mellon Foundation and Washington University in St. Louis are proud to support the two-year Modeling Interdisciplinary Postdoctoral Fellowship in the humanities and social sciences each year. The program is endowed by the Mellon Foundation and is designed to encourage interdisciplinary scholarship and teaching across the humanities and interpretive social sciences.

Meet Alex Ullman, Modeling Interdisciplinary Inquiry Postdoctoral Fellow

Meet Alex Ullman, Modeling Interdisciplinary Inquiry Postdoctoral Fellow

About the program

Washington University in St. Louis announces the 24th year of Modeling Interdisciplinary Inquiry, a postdoctoral fellowship program endowed by the Mellon Foundation, designed to support postdoctoral research that bridges disciplines across the humanities and humanistic social sciences in novel ways. Postdoctoral fellows are appointed for a term of two years and participate in campus life at WashU through their residence in the Center for the Humanities, their teaching in the undergraduate program and their participation in workshops and reading groups. Since the aim of the fellowship is to facilitate and enrich research in the humanities that straddles fields, postdoctoral fellows are supported by mentors that help navigate disciplines of interest.

Modeling Interdisciplinary Inquiry

Stephanie Kirk, director of the Center for the Humanities and professor of Hispanic studies in the Department of Romance Languages and Literatures, is the director of the Modeling Interdisciplinary Inquiry Postdoctoral Fellowship program.

How to apply

The Mellon Postdoctoral Fellowship in Modeling Interdisciplinarity Inquiry is designed to encourage interdisciplinary scholarship and teaching across the humanities and interpretive social sciences. We invite applications from recent PhDs, DPhils or DFAs (in hand by June 30, 2025, and no earlier than June 30, 2022) who have not previously held a research-oriented postdoctoral fellowship for a position as Fellow. In mid August 2025, the newly selected fellow will join the university’s ongoing interdisciplinary programs and seminars. The fellow will receive a two-year appointment with a nine-month academic year salary. Postdoctoral fellows pursue their own continuing research in association with a senior faculty mentor at WU. During the two years of their fellowship, they will teach three undergraduate courses and collaborate in leading an interdisciplinary seminar on theory and methods for advanced undergraduates and beginning graduate students in the humanities and social sciences.

Applicants should submit, through Interfolio, a cover letter, a curriculum vitae, a description of their research program (no more than 1800 words and accessible to reviewers in other disciplines), and a brief proposal (up to one page) for an interdisciplinary advanced undergraduate seminar. Applicants who have not completed their doctoral work should indicate, in their cover letter, how many chapters of their dissertation are complete and how complete the remaining chapters are. Please include the names and email addresses of three references.

The to submit materials for the 2025–27 fellowship is December 19, 2024. 

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Applications currently being accepted

Applications for the Modeling Interdisciplinary Inquiry Postdoctoral Fellowship for the 2025–27 term are being accepted through Thursday, December 19, 2024. Click on the button below to submit your materials through Interfolio.

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