Grad Fellows' Top Three: Fellowship, Feedback and Food

The Center for the Humanities welcomes applications for its Graduate Student Fellowships from Washington University humanities graduate students who have been awarded a Dissertation Fellowship from the Graduate School of Arts & Sciences. Look for an announcement in spring 2015.

In addition to a stipend and a workspace, Graduate Student Fellows have the opportunity to workshop portions of their dissertation and join the humanities center Faculty Fellows, Faculty Seminars, and Faculty and Graduate Student Reading Groups in creating a vibrant, interdisciplinary environment at the center.



Noah Cohan
While at the humanities center I’ve been working on my dissertation’s fourth chapter. The larger work is titled "'We Average Unbeautiful Watchers': Reflexive Fans and the Readerly Stakes of American Sports Narratives.” In it, I argue that we can best grasp sports not as real events with objective results, but as narratives; mass-mediated athletics are consumed, variously interpreted and assigned personal significance in a manner most similar to the way books, films and other narrative entertainments are read. Examining a wide range of literary and cultural narratives that depict the readers of sports — the fans — I assert that the tools of critical textual inquiry are not only appropriate but are necessary if we are to understand the way sports inform the identities of millions of Americans. The fourth chapter, “Reimagined Communities: Web-Mediated Fandom and Subjective Narrativity,” extends my analysis of the fan-reader as author into the Internet era, arguing that the easily accessible publishing platforms of the blogosphere have enabled fans to publicly appropriate and renarrativize the sports, teams and players they covet. Cataloguing and closely reading texts produced by multiple narrative-oriented online fan communities, I demonstrate that these fan authors create a literature of sport unfettered by the implied narrative restrictions of “real” competition, freeing them to explore political, personal and philosophical themes often thought unavailable or limited in sporting texts. Given my argument and its investment in electronically mediated narratives, the chapter takes as its primary form a website that allows readers to experience the larger web networks of contemporary American sports fandom via links, pictures and video — in effect, furthering my analysis by inhabiting the form as I examine it.

The fellowship allowed me to pursue the unconventional aspects of my dissertation project in a supportive environment.
My favorite thing about my fellowship was engaging with fellow humanists in cross-disciplinary critical conversation.
The most unexpected thing about my fellowship was how delicious the food was at our lunch workshops.
I would recommend this fellowship to graduate students who are invested in using multidisciplinary methods.


Margaret Dobbins
In my dissertation, Queer Accounts: Stories of Economic Change in the Victorian Novel, I argue that as economic developments in the 19th century put pressure on social identities and relations in England, novelists envisioned new, queer forms of desire in a capitalist society. Since Foucault’s History of Sexuality, queer theorists have identified the 19th century as the defining moment when “heterosexuality” and “homosexuality” emerge, effacing more fluid forms of sexual desire. My research revises this history by uncovering the overlooked link between the imperatives of the market economy and heteronormative desire originating in the British Empire. I begin by asking why the novels of high realism fix so persistently on figures outside the prevailing sex-gender system: widows, miserly bachelors and businesswomen. Rather than seeing these characters as anomalies who must be assimilated into the heterosexual family and the capitalist ethos, I explore how mid-century novels illuminate a queer history of modern economic thought. The broad interest of this project lies in exploring how humanists tell stories of economic change in social terms: Novels take stock of the radical changes that capital wreaks on existing social structures in Victorian England, and, in the process, offer “queer accounts” of desire in a capitalist society.

The fellowship allowed me to finish writing a chapter and practice presenting my work to a friendly and incisive audience of interdisciplinary scholars. 
My favorite thing about my fellowship was getting to learn about current scholarship in fields outside my own.
The most unexpected thing about my fellowship has been how my thinking about my role in the university has shifted. My fellowship at the center has not only benefited my research but also helped me professionalize as a scholar-educator in the humanities. 
I would recommend this fellowship to graduate students who​ want a lively, supportive and educating environment to combat the ennui of dissertation-writing and remember what they value about the humanities as they complete their graduate research. 

En Li
My project, titled “Betting on Empire: A Socio-Cultural History of Gambling in Late-Qing China,” uses the practice and licensing of gambling, especially the lotteries, to investigate social, political and cultural changes in the transitional period of late-Qing China and in its global context. This research begins with a study of a civil service examination scandal in 1885. A highly organized lottery scheme, where money was bet on surnames that would pass the state’s official selection exam, spurred manipulation of the exam results. Based on archival research, I conclude that instead of being a social vice or individual moral defect, the lottery contributed to a more inclusive public by providing people with simultaneous experiences across time and space. Moreover, licensing allowed the Qing state to extend its power in local society by incorporating gambling, an irrational activity, into a rational ruling framework. As a social practice in China, gaming became a cultural custom in its communities abroad. Gambling created a local, national and transnational network. Similar to commodities such as sugar, coffee, tea and codfish, gambling was able to spread across the globe, often along the same trade routes. Gambling became an important part of public culture in late-Qing China for its reorganization of interpersonal relations, cultivation of a de-radicalized society, and facilitation of exchanges in information, materials and capital in an increasingly interconnected world.
 
The fellowship allowed me to complete a draft of the whole dissertation, present a chapter and have a practice conference talk, attend many intriguing events on and off campus, get to know what other graduate student and faculty fellows are working on, obtain advice from excellent mentors on my project and career path in formal and informal settings, and enjoy LOTS of good food.
My favorite thing about my fellowship was support from people. Dissertating is a long and isolated journey. It’s nice to have companions. My fellowship provides lots of support to make my writing process happier. I have been getting lots of help especially from Kathy and Barb, two lovely staff members at the center. I remember seeing Kathy spend a morning decorating a Halloween theme room right across the hallway from my office for undergraduate students to take selfies and post on the Wash. U. website [part of Arts & Sciences’ Trick or Tweet]. It has been a tough semester. I am lucky to be at a fun place.
The most unexpected thing about my fellowship was to have an individual office with beautiful view, which allows me to write uninterruptedly even during weekends and evenings. It has been my second home. I feel sad to move out. [Offices are assigned based on current availability.]
I would recommend this fellowship to graduate students who​ are ready to write a lot, enjoy being around people and love free food.