Tools for Transformation

Funded Proposals

Taylor Institute

International Studies, College of Arts & Sciences

The George E. Taylor Foreign Affairs Institute will be made into a University-wide vehicle for stimulating innovative teaching and research in the social sciences. The intent is for the Taylor Institute to integrate the area studies programs and the international expertise of their faculty with other university faculty members interested in transnational and global issues. The Institute will be an important vehicle in facilitating inter-departmental, inter-college, and inter-campus collaborations in teaching and researching issues relating broadly to the integration of the social sciences at UW, particularly with regard to issues of global significance.

Update: The Taylor Institute is now the Institute for Transnational Studies. The director of the institute is Uta Poiger, Associate Professor of History. Their website is http://depts.washington.edu/its.

PROGRESS REPORT

The Taylor Institute was established in attempt to provide a space for coordination of Jackson School research. It was also created to promote collaboration among faculty members throughout the University, including professional schools and the branch campuses and to extend an area-studies focus to departments and schools across the University. To that end we established, with the help of a Ford Foundation Grant "Crossing Borders, Revitalizing Area Studies," four pilot research programs. These programs are Women and Democratization; Global Designs and Implementations: Law, State, and Society; Transnational and Transregional Migrations and the Politics of Identity and Culture; and Local Economies in an Age of Global Capitalism.

Each of the four research programs has been individually successful. Current activities of these research programs include collaborative research projects with foreign institutions, a seminar series for graduate students, international workshops, curriculum restructuring, and a public lecture series. Provided that faculty leaders for each of the research programs secure outside funding, these programs will branch out and develop a Web-based international research consortium, found a translation and working papers series, create new classes, foster faculty/graduate student collaboration, and start a new free-standing research center.

Members of the Institute committee are debating the possibilities for a theory/practice partnership with the Evans School of Public Affairs (ESPA) to promote interdisciplinary research, teaching, and professional training. This partnership would result in a graduate-level certificate program housed in ESPA for the training of individuals wanting to pursue applied area studies for work in overseas-related careers.

The future success of the Institute in its bid to become the central research coordination office for the Jackson School and the possibility for a theory/practice partnership depends on two elements: leadership and funding. The Institute will undergo a change in personnel this summer due to the fact that its current Director, Gary Hamilton, will be on sabbatical next year. The new director has not yet been named.

A full set of plans has been outlined for next year. The Institute will be sponsoring an international conference entitled "Boundaries and Belonging" examining territorial borders and creation of a sense of belonging for social groups and two seminar classes: Matt Spark's (Geography and the Jackson School) "Cosmopolitics in Question: The Borders of Culture and the Culture of Borders" and Lynn Thomas's (History) "Post-Colonial Approaches to Identity Formation and Migration in African Worlds." There are several proposals for research grants, which will be submitted during the next academic year. The Institute is thankful for the Tools support, which has helped make these activities a possibility.

Tools for Transformation Funded Proposals

The Provost's Office
provost@u.washington.edu
Modified: June 20, 2003