Andrew W. Mellon Post-Doctoral Position Humanities and Higher Education in Prison

College of Arts and Sciences

POSITION:  Andrew W. Mellon Post-Doctoral Position Humanities and Higher Education in Prison  

Stetson University seeks candidates who hold a Ph.D. in a humanities discipline and whose research scholarship engages in food studies for an 18-month Mellon postdoctoral teaching and research fellowship. The academic appointment will be in the College of Arts and Sciences and aligned with the Community Education Project (CEP), a multidisciplinary higher education in prison program at Stetson University. We seek a teacher-scholar who engages in Food Studies and can work in an interdisciplinary context as well as carceral setting. We also prefer a candidate with expertise in one or more of the following subfields: African/Black (Diasporic) Studies; Disability Studies; Latin American and Latinx Studies; Ethnic Studies; Post-Colonial Studies; Carceral and Policing Studies; Gender Studies; or Migration Studies. The candidate’s research program can focus on local, regional, national, and global issues and be interdisciplinary in nature, although preference will be given to applicants with degrees in humanities. 

The funding for this position and the larger project, “Seeding Justice: Collaborative Learning Landscapes in Carceral Spaces,” comes from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation’s “Future of Higher Learning in Prisons” grant program. The position is fixed-term.

QUALIFICATIONS:

This position requires a Ph.D. (awarded by January 1, 2022) in a humanities field, or a Ph.D. in a field with significant interdisciplinary potential, demonstrated excellence in teaching undergraduates, and knowledge of or experience in working within the field of food studies. We seek a colleague who is actively engaged in research on sustainability and food systems that also allows for collaborations with undergraduate incarcerated students; enthusiastic about working across disciplines with shared interests in food studies; and eager to contribute to our higher education in prison program. The successful candidate should be a teacher-scholar dedicated to engaging students from diverse backgrounds and capable of working independently with incarcerated students at Tomoka Correctional Institution. We especially encourage candidates from underrepresented backgrounds to apply.

RESPONSIBILITIES:

The teaching load for this fellowship involves teaching 1) a credit-bearing course in the humanities at Tomoka Correctional Institution in Spring 2022 and in Spring 2023; and 2) one team-taught First-Year Seminar, “Prisons and Society” offered in the college’s Honors Program at the DeLand campus in Fall 2022. These courses can be tailored to the successful candidate’s research interests, and are taught to incarcerated students.

Other major responsibilities include supporting  incarcerated student-scholars and their emergent scholarship, and participating in the development of the CEP’s initiatives at TCI that are focused on food studies. The successful candidate will be able to pursue individual research projects as well as collaborate with CEP students when possible; present their work to the local and national audiences at the end of the fellowship; and utilize resources for professional development and networks provided by Stetson University and CEP. The position also offers resources to support candidate’s professional development such as protected time for individual research,  access to workshops and mentorship from the Brown Center for Faculty Innovation and Excellence, and teaching interdisciplinary courses, including courses that fulfill College of Arts and Sciences General Education requirements. 

For more information on our expectations in teaching and scholarship and our support for faculty development, please see the Office of the Provost and Academic Affairs website: http://www.stetson.edu/provost.

THE PROGRAM:

The Community Education Project (CEP) is a multidisciplinary college in prison program at Stetson University committed to offering quality liberal arts education and learning opportunities At Tomoka Correctional Institution (TCI). CEP is a faculty-founded and faculty-led program. Access to a liberal arts education offers incarcerated individuals meaningful opportunities for personal growth and intellectual engagement, which benefits our community as a whole. CEP promotes liberatory teaching and peer learning rooted in the humanities. Building on existing scholarship on teaching apprenticeship and radical collaboration, incarcerated scholars conduct original research, present their emerging scholarship, and actively shape programming at TCI. For more information, please visit the CEP website: https://www.stetson.edu/other/cep/

The new Food Studies initiative aligns with a broader national food justice movement that addresses systemic inequities in our food system stemming from U.S. agriculture’s roots in slavery, land theft, and exploitation. Specifically, the initiative will provide a learning landscape to expand humanities instruction and collaborative research as well as give students opportunities to claim connections to food production denied to most incarcerated people.

THE COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES:

Stetson’s College of Arts and Sciences (http://www.stetson.edu/portal/artsci/) is the largest and most diverse of the University’s colleges and schools; it includes the humanities, social sciences, natural sciences, education, and creative arts. With nineteen academic departments and nine interdisciplinary programs, the College is the liberal arts core of the University. A great strength of the College is its faculty of approximately 140 full-time teacher-scholars. The College offers 31 undergraduate majors and 34 undergraduate minors; six graduate degrees are offered in Education, Counselor Education, and Creative Writing. Every undergraduate major requires a senior research project, giving students the opportunity to design and carry out independent research under faculty mentorship. Our academic programs are shaped by the values of social justice and civic responsibility. All of our courses and programs of study promote engaged learning, whereby students create connections between the classroom or lab and the local, regional, and global community. The academic programs of the College of Arts and Sciences prepare students to live significant lives, to interact with and positively affect the world around them.

THE UNIVERSITY:

Founded in 1883, Stetson University (http://www.stetson.edu) is a private, selective university comprised of a rich array of liberal arts and professional academic programs. Collectively, Stetson’s faculty works with nearly 4,300 students in undergraduate, graduate, and professional programs. The University’s historic main campus, located in DeLand, enrolls more than 3,000 students in undergraduate programs in the College of Arts & Sciences, the School of Business Administration, and the School of Music. Stetson University College of Law, Florida’s first law school, moved from the main campus to Gulfport in 1954, and, with the addition of the Tampa Law Center, serves approximately 1,000 students working full-time or part-time toward J.D. or LL.M. degrees. The University’s graduate programs include Business, Accounting, Educational Leadership, Counseling, and Creative Writing. Florida’s oldest private institution of higher learning, Stetson has regularly been ranked among the best regional universities in the Southeast and was the first private college in Florida to be granted a chapter of Phi Beta Kappa. Stetson University provides an inspiring education that engages students with rigorous academic and creative study grounded in liberal learning and promotes civic values of personal and social responsibility. Working closely with faculty and with one another, students cultivate abilities to explore issues deeply, think critically, reason empirically, speak persuasively, and connect ideas creatively. Firmly committed to inclusive excellence, our vibrant community of teacher-scholars nurtures the potential of individual students to lead lives of significance and prepares each to meet the challenges of shaping the future— locally, nationally, and globally.

THE COMMUNITY:

DeLand is a picturesque residential community of 32,000 located 20 miles west of Daytona Beach and 35 miles northeast of Orlando. The area offers extensive cultural as well as recreational activities.

SALARY: Salary is competitive

STARTING DATE: January 7, 2022

APPLICATION: Applicants should supply a: (1) cover letter; (2) curriculum vitae; (3) statement of teaching philosophy; (4) full contact information for three references (at least one of which should be able to address the candidate’s teaching ability; these references will only be contacted if a candidate is a semi-finalist for the position). In the cover letter, candidates are encouraged to highlight skills and experiences that demonstrate a commitment to social justice, diversity, and inclusion, as well as interest in working with incarcerated students. 

All information may be submitted electronically to both: pcappast@stetson.edu and cburke@stetson.edu.  While electronic submissions are preferred, alternatively application materials may be mailed to:

Stetson University, World Languages and Cultures 421 N. Woodland Blvd. DeLand, FL 32723

The deadline for receipt of all materials is October 1, and review of applications will begin immediately.