Exeter PHD Students awarded Library of Congress fellowship

Rhian Keyse and Mathilde Pavis, both studying at Exeter, are amongst 27 postgraduate students and early career researchers to be offered the opportunity the Arts and Humanities Research Council International Placement Scheme (IPS) which provides funded research fellowships for doctoral students at world-leading international research institutions.

During the fellowship, the students will have the opportunity to enhance the depth, range and quality of their research working within research centres with thriving research cultures.

The students will also benefit from privileges that are not available to independent visiting scholars including the prestige of being part of a cohort of international fellows, which sees some of the world’s best thinkers taking part in research and discussion using the rich resources of the Library.

Rhian Keyse is a postgraduate student studying ‘forced and early marriage in British colonial Africa, 1927-55’. She said, "I am honoured to have the opportunity to take up this prestigious three-month fellowship. I am so excited to have the opportunity to work at the Library of Congress, and to live and study in Washington DC. Being offered this fellowship allows me to further my research by taking advantage of the unrivalled collections at the library, especially rare African primary source materials and the foreign language collections. In addition, networking with other scholars and access to the expertise of the library staff will further my research immeasurably."

Mathilde Pavis, also a postgraduate student studying the ‘Art of the Insane’, has already started a six month fellowship at the Library. She said “The breadth of material available at the Library of Congress is unparalleled and will provide me with a rich opportunity to explore the archives and collections in Arts and Law I would not have access to otherwise. I am very excited to meet people interested in similar lines of research to exchange ideas but also further my horizons in terms of international networks in my field.

The Library of Congress (LOC) is the oldest federal cultural institution in America and serves as the research arm of Congress. It has 12,000 new items added daily to over 158 million items in 470 languages, on 838 miles of bookshelves. IPS fellows at LOC will be part of a cohort of international fellows with opportunities to take part in conferences, symposia, special lectures, present work to peers and mentors, and network and forge international contacts and collaborations. The IPS LOC fellows will be in residence at LOC from October 2015 and will be based at the John W Kluge Center.