Telling the Story of Your Work: Writing a Research Statement for Grant and Fellowship Applications
How to write a research statement that speaks to your audience, tells the narrative of your research, and gets you the grant money you need for your MA, PhD, and other scholarly work
Welcome to this week’s bonus post of Reading Art!
Last week, I shared a personal statement I wrote for my application for UCLA’s Dissertation Year Award, which gives a stipend as well as tuition/fee reimbursement to graduate students in their final year of writing the dissertation.
The personal statement is a place to tell the narrative of your life as a scholar and how the award/grant will fit into that. But just as important is the substance of your project itself, and in general applications will ask for a research statement to be included in the application dossier. For this week’s bonus post, I’m going to share the draft of the research statement I wrote for the DYA.
When writing your research statement, you’ll want to do a few things:
Go beyond the classic “hook.” Yes, a catchy opening is essential—you don’t want your readers to be bored right off the bat—but remember that the committee reading your work is probably made up of people who are academics themselves. I like to start out by framing the project as a “mystery” of sorts that your audience will definitely want to solve. Start in medias res if you can, using an interesting anecdote from your research or starting with a particularly resonant scene from art or literature (assuming you’re working in the humanities).
Go beyond the classic “lit review.” Of course, you’ll want to touch on some questions: Who else is working in this field? How will your research fit into the current body of literature around the topic? But, honestly, unless the application specifically asks for it, I have found it’s better to integrate these tidbits throughout the proposal. Otherwise, your research proposal starts to sound like a book report. Aim for 10-15 citations. Too few is questionable, but too many makes it seem a little unfocused, in my opinion.
Clearly put forth an ambitious schedule that makes the review committee feel very certain that you will achieve something tangible: a completed dissertation, an edited book manuscript, a draft of an article that is ready to be submitted, whatever it may be. At the same time, don’t sound arrogant, or make claims you can’t ensure; e.g., don’t say something like, “After the fellowship, my manuscript will be accepted for publication by [specific journal or press]”, unless you have some very good reason to believe this will be so. Instead, mention 1-3 journals/presses/conferences/other venues that might be appropriate places for your completed work to find a home. This particular tip wasn’t super relevant for the DYA, since the clear goal is just “finish the dissertation,” but has come up for other fellowships I’ve received in graduate school, and I do mention it at the very end.
Don’t worry about a big dramatic conclusion; in my experience, the start is more important than the finish. At the beginning, your audience needs to feel intrigued and eager to learn more. At the end, they really just need to feel a sense of steadfast confidence in your proposal.
Quote other scholars sparingly; I prefer in-text parenthetical citations, although the application guidelines may have other rules. You really want to lead with your ideas and present yourself as someone who is already an expert; the grant/award/fellowship is just going to work as a kind of accelerator for the things you’re already achieving.
Without further ado, here’s my research proposal for the Dissertation Year Award at UCLA:
The Phantasia of Philosophy in the Roman Empire
Abstract
In the Roman Empire, philosophy was as much a brand, an aesthetic, or even a viral sensation as it was an academic discipline. Not so much concerned with practitioners of philosophy as with its fans, I argue that there is much to learn from the various iterations of “pop” philosophy in the ancient world, focusing on works that feature philosophy, but are not themselves philosophical treatises. I document how the sophistical, rhetorical, and generally campy works of this era do not simply recapitulate tired stereotypes, but rather prompt metaliterary reflection on complex philosophical ideas and the role of philosophy in the Roman world. I suggest that philosophy was not simply a tool for intellectual self-fashioning, but that it also exerted considerable influence over its fans. For example, Seneca describes his collection of statues of various philosophers as his “friends” who inspire him to come up with new ideas of his own—not just repeat the ideas of the past. In the first two chapters, I argue that Imperial authors were aware of philosophy’s propensity to being reduced to a stereotype, and intentionally represented philosophy as a “brand” is an entity that is actually separate from true wisdom. In the second two chapters, I suggest that philosophy has a physical presence in the world around us, analyzing both personifications of philosophy in literature and the real-life monuments constructed to philosophy in antiquity and in modernity. In sum, the phantasia (appearance) of philosophy was always “trending” in the Imperial era. It took on a life of its own and was a source of innovation and creativity, not merely a set of moral rules to be learned and repeated.
Introduction
In the estimation of many nineteenth- and twentieth-century scholars, the entire Second Sophistic (the era from the 1st to 3rdcenturies CE of Greek writing under Roman rule) was useless from a scholarly standpoint: its intellectuals were egotistical sophists, and its literature was an unending remake of the objectively better works of the Classical period. Even the artwork of the period was deemed unoriginal, mere copies of Greek statues and buildings. Some have even suggested that the importance of the Second Sophistic was overstated by the ancients themselves (e.g. Brunt 1994). In this view, perhaps nothing exemplified the Second Sophistic’s boring “unoriginality” so much as its reception of Greek philosophy. Second Sophistic authors loved to portray philosophy as a stereotype—and, worse still, they often got it all wrong, erroneously portraying Epicureans as unbridled hedonists and Platonists as gleeful supporters of tyranny. The 1970s, however, saw an increased interest in this period (cf. Bowersock 1969; Bowie 1970), and in recent decades scholars have taken its literary output seriously (e.g. Swain 1996; Whitmarsh 2001; Kim 2009; ní Mhalleaigh 2013). Nonetheless, the cultural significance of philosophy in this time period still remains largely undertheorized.
My dissertation therefore expands the boundaries of the intellectual history of Greek philosophy, focusing on works that are generally considered to portray something that is not actually philosophy, but rather a tacky, artificial, and sophistical impression of it. The project will therefore draw on approaches from classical philology, art history, and social history, while also relying on comparative readings with philosophical treatises in order to better recognize intertextual connections that highlight the complex relationship between professional/academic philosophy and its pop culture counterpart. The authors who create this image of “pop culture” philosophy both rely on conventional stereotypes regarding what philosophy is and magnify it beyond its historical boundaries, imagining a world in which we are surrounded by philosophy in our daily lives. My dissertation accepts that the depiction of Greek philosophy in the Second Sophistic is frequently comedic, exaggerated, and even inaccurate from a historical standpoint. I argue, however, that these unacademic works still convey something beyond mere entertainment, prompting metaliterary reflection on legitimate intellectual issues, including the role of the philosopher or authority figure in society; the significance of the Greek philosophical tradition in the Roman period; and issues of importance to philosophical authors, such as the meaning of friendship or the way to lead a good life. If their authors err from actual philosophical doctrine, it is done intentionally to make a point, not out of a lack of originality or an inability to comprehend philosophical ideas.
In the first chapter, “Parasites and Other Unexpected Intellectuals,” I study how authors Alciphron and Aelian use stock characters familiar from Old Comedy as mouthpieces of philosophical discourse in order to explore issues surrounding friendship and social reciprocity. These works feature characters who are generally believed to be incapable of philosophizing in dialogue with one another. And yet, philosophy is their constant companion even when they themselves do not realize it. Here, I analyze in greater depth the divide between “professional” philosophy, which is almost universally portrayed as ostentatious, fraudulent, and harmful to society, and a more natural form of “common sense” wisdom that ironically flourishes most among those who are most removed from elite intellectual culture. This chapter demonstrates how even a comedic work can spark metaliterary consideration of weightier topics.
In the second chapter, “The Problem of Plato,” philosophy again finds itself embodied in a surprisingly unsuitable character: not in a divine and sagacious Plato, but rather an envious and irritable one. The “bad” Plato raises the question of how we relate to our intellectual “ancestors” (cf. Eshleman 2012: 83). I argue that many Second Sophistic authors attempt to revise the popular notion of Plato as the archetypal Greek philosopher, tracing out a pattern in the history of Plato’s reception that has previously gone unnoticed: Greek authors frequently emphasize Plato’s alleged flaws, while Roman authors rarely portray these flaws at all. When they do, they recuperate them into virtues. Ultimately, any depiction of the flawed Plato allows the author to show himself in a Socratic mode, questioning even one of the most canonical Greek thinkers. Like in Chapter 1, we see a separation between “philosophy” (here, as represented by Plato) and actual wisdom.
In the third chapter, “Empires of Philosophy in Lucian and Dio Chrysostom,” I discuss certain instances in which philosophy itself is personified, and its authors imagine the influence of this academic discipline in matters of state and empire. In Lucian’s Runaways, Philosophy is depicted as a conqueror or even Emperor-like figure, and indeed in other works philosophy also seems to act like a tool of empire-building, of making even the most foreign of nations “compatible” with Greco-Roman intellectual culture. While both Dio and Lucian often portray philosophy in a caricature-like fashion, Lucian’s openly satirical tone is perhaps easier to understand. In contrast, Dio’s historically inaccurate view of schools such as Epicureanism can be more puzzling (cf. Russell 1992: 187). I suggest Dio uses the stereotypical version of Epicureanism to reframe “Greekness” as a cultural group defined by its loyalty to philosophy.
In the fourth chapter, “Inside the Epicurean Memory Theater,” I discuss cultural heritage objects depicting Epicurus or Epicurean teachings as material embodiments of the so-called “memory theater,” an ancient and early modern mnemonic technique. Here, I focus on the stoa of Diogenes of Oenoanda, which was covered in Epicurean writings. This chapter analyzes the stoa as a lieu de memoire (cf. Nora 1989) that triggers memory not only of Epicureanism, but also of the Roman Imperial world. To help us better understand Diogenes’ Epicurean stoa, I compare the modern-day botanical garden Little Sparta in Scotland, the creation of poet and “avant gardener” Ian Hamilton Finlay, whose inscribed poems and other physical features make frequent reference to ancient philosophy. In both works, the creators juxtapose past philosophical ideas and present-day realities to both reflect and create collective memories.
Research Plan
I have currently finished a draft of the first of the four chapters and am on track to submit a draft of the second chapter to my committee by the end of March. I plan to then begin Chapter 3 in the spring and submit it to my committee by the end of June. In July and August, job postings will begin to be advertised, and I will use the summer to revise Chapter 1 of my dissertation for use as a writing sample when I submit job applications throughout the fall. As my fourth chapter discusses material culture, I will also use the time to visit museums on an as-needed basis to conduct research and plan to consult the Getty Research Institute’s Special Collections to further investigate what I believe will be fruitful parallels in modern works of literature and art. I propose to begin the DYA on October 1, and would use the award period to finish Chapter 4, complete the Introduction and Conclusion, revise the dissertation, and prepare an article to submit to a peer-reviewed journal based on one of my completed chapters.
Reading back, it honestly kind of sounds like my dissertation was already complete at this point, and that’s very much the effect you want to go for, while still making a good case in your personal statement about why you actually need the award. But you do want to convey that you’ll be a reliable awardee who will make the award program look good with your achievements. As you can see, I frame the dissertation as something that goes together cohesively, and even the yet-unwritten parts have a clear direction and goal for the work in its entirety. Just as you as a scholar have a life story that needs to be conveyed in the personal statement, your research also has an arc and a story that needs to be teased out.
I hope you enjoyed this week’s bonus post! Leave a comment with any questions or further tips for those applying for fellowships.
Take care until next time.
MKA