Brown University invites applications for two three-year Postdoctoral Research Associate positions beginning on September 1, 2025. The Postdoctoral Research Associates will work closely with the project team developing the African Poetry Digital Portal Project, led by Kwame Dawes, Professor of Literary Arts and Principal Investigator of the project, and Lorna Dawes, Exploration and Research Librarian and co-Principal Investigator on the project, as well as the staff at the Center for Digital Scholarship at Brown University.
The African Poetry Book Fund promotes and advances the development and publication of the poetic arts through its book series, contests, workshops, and seminars and through its collaborations with publishers, festivals, booking agents, colleges, universities, conferences and all other entities that share an interest in the poetic arts of Africa. We are committed to seeking the resources to support this mission and to ensure that all its efforts are carried out with excellence.
We seek scholars with expertise in Literary Arts, Africana Studies, English, Comparative Literature, and/or Digital Humanities.
The project documents the work of African poets and provides equitable digital access to the related creative and intellectual artifacts, materials, and research on the subject of African Poetry that is housed in academic and cultural institutions in Africa and its diaspora in order to, among other things, create accessible ways to engender an informed, culturally diverse, civically engaged, and responsible society.
One Postdoctoral Research Associate will be involved in the oversight and continued development of African Poetry in the News section of the African Poetry Digital Portal and critical analysis of related news articles. We seek a scholar grounded in theoretical and critical literary studies with research interests in poetry across Africa and the diaspora. The scholar’s research should focus on the examination of the literary traditions, techniques, and themes within poetry from the African continent, with special attention paid to the unique elements of African oral traditions; African cultural practices; and the impact of slavery, colonialism, and post-colonization on poetic expression. The scholar’s research methods would rely on analyzing the works of prominent African poets and their evolving styles across different regions and time periods.
One Postdoctoral Research Associate will be responsible for the oversight and management of the research work on the Index of Contemporary African Poets and the African Poetry Bibliographies. This involves developing lists of poets to expand the index by including poets of each past decade in manageable and relevant increments, completing biographical and bibliographical details of the poets, and recruiting and supervising a research team of scholars to carry out these research tasks.
The Postdoctoral Research Associates will each teach one course per year in Comparative Literature Department, English Department, or Literary Arts Department at Brown University.
The Postdoctoral Research Associates will have opportunities to work among an interdisciplinary group of scholars and students whose projects focus on African poetry. These positions foster the academic careers of scholars who have recently received their PhD degrees by permitting them to pursue their research while gaining mentored experience as research scholars and teachers.
Key Responsibilities - African Poetry in the News Postdoctoral Position
•Manage and maintain continued development of the African Poetry in the News sectionof the African Poetry Digital Portal.
• Identify African newspapers (print and digital) located in institutions across the world that can assist in building a dynamic African Poetry primary resource database.
• Collect, input, and edit the metadata for news items related to the African Poets and Poetry databases.
• Write critical commentaries assessing the presentation of African poetry in newspapers under review.
• Solicit and edit critical commentaries and articles on themes and subjects related to the position of African poetry and African poets in the newspapers under review.
• Teach one course per year.
Key Responsibilities - Index of African Poets and African Poetry Digital Bibliographies
•Manage research related to the African Poetry Digital Bibliographies and the Index of Contemporary African Poets.
•Expand foundational research of bibliographies for select African poets.
•Prepare for crowd-sourcing bibliography projects on selected writers.
•Produce extended bibliographies on major African poets and on critical areas in African Poetry and Poetics.
•Oversee and manage research work on the Index of Contemporary African Poets and African Poet Bibliographies.
•Develop lists of poets to expand the index, including poets from past decades.
•Complete biographical and bibliographical details of poets in the index.
•Recruit and supervise a research team of scholars to carry out research tasks.
•Update metadata as biographical entries are completed.
•Review, edit, copy-edit, and supervise revisions and additions to the work produced.
•Teach one course per year.
Qualifications
Required Education and Experience
• These positions are for scholars who will have completed a PhD within the last three years. ABD candidates welcome to apply, as long as they will have completed all degree requirements by September 1, 2025.
• Proven record of research in and experience in writing critically on African poetry and African poetics.
• Proven knowledge of African literature and postcolonial discourse and analysis.
• Proven experience in editing and copy-editing.
• Good skills in critical research, including familiarity with key databases, archives, primary source collections, and other research tools.
• Interest in learning about digital humanities, digital humanities tools, and the creation of metadata.
• Experience or interest in interdisciplinary research and fostering diverse academic communities.
Preferred Experience and Skills
• Familiarity with African languages.
• Experienced in digital humanities research, digital humanities tools, and the creation of metadata.
• Experience with African Digital Humanities with a focus on African Literature.
• Experience with or willingness to work with U.S. and international collaborators, stakeholders, and community members, including students, librarians, university staff and faculty, publishers, authors, arts administrators, and other professionals.
• Experience with leading a research team and/or managing student workers.
• Experience in overseeing the research agenda of a scholarly project.
Application Instructions
Apply - Interfolio
Submit a cover letter, CV, and scholarly writing sample.
In your cover letter, please indicate which academic department Comparative Literature or English would be the best fit for your research and teaching interests. Courses may be cross-listed with Literary Arts.
Recommendation letters or references will be solicited if an application proceeds to a later stage in the review process.
Brown University seeks to recruit and retain a diverse workforce to maintain the excellence of the University, and to offer our students richly varied disciplines, perspectives, viewpoints, and ways of knowing and learning.