UCCSC REGIONAL SEMINARS
AND RESEARCH WORKGROUPS 2010-11

Extended Deadline: February 15, 2010                  Grantees of the program for 2009-10

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UCCSC encourages a regional perspective based on the state's three distinct but related regions: Southern California, Central California, and Northern California. While each is geographically located, all contain distinct and often familiar characteristics based on demography, culture, politics and economics that locate them in ways that recognize and, simultaneously, reach far beyond actual location. Increasingly, with a dramatic expansion in population, even smaller ethnic, multi-county and bioregional clusters have emerged as important sites of social formation, cultural production, public policy, economic development, and environmental sustainability. Equally encouraged within this broad framework of analysis are examinations of historic, contemporary, and emerging sub-regional realities within the three areas below.

1. Perhaps the most ethnically diverse region on the planet, Southern California is also a global cultural center. This vast and varied landscape contains extremes of wealth and poverty. In addition to being a gateway to Latin America, Asia, and Pacific Islands, the region has evolved as a central place in national discourse on economics, politics, race and ethnic relations, militarization, agriculture, globalization, immigration, housing, technology, and environmental sustainability. The region is currently experiencing a renaissance of new critical studies.

2. Geologically, the Central Valley is a wide basin, beginning in the area of Bakersfield and extending north, as far as the area of Redding. Long California's underrepresented "little sister," the Central Valley has existed far enough under the state's cultural radar to possess a resistant identity, whether forced upon it or aggressively embraced. The Central Valley and its inhabitants are primed for many studies "from below," culturally, politically, and demographically.

3. Economically, politically, racially and ethnically varied, the histories of Northern California are inscribed with the growth and development of its two population centers, San Francisco and Sacramento, and the effects of both centers on the surrounding areas and inhabitants. Rich in artistic and literary movements and an incubator for policy, the area's poles of liberal and conservative collide and create productive areas of research.

We invite proposals looking at Northern, Southern, or Central California, centering on new or evolving themes that will map out new regions of critical California Studies. We particularly encourage the following proposals:

• Seminars with a regional focus
• California regional studies
• Comparative regionalism
• Topical foci such as ethnic and race studies; the environment; gender; work; human rights; citizenship; housing; poverty; education; cultural practices

Activities might include the following:

• Retreats of scholars, perhaps organized by a convener to address a particular problem, policy, or recent issue
• Faculty-led seminars for graduate students
• Off-campus forums involving community stakeholders
• Faculty workgroups intent on furthering a particular area of California regional studies scholarship
• K-12 or university curricula transformation

Joint proposals, among campuses or across schools and/or divisions, are particularly encouraged.

Preferred proposals might show some level of engagement—whether in alignment, tension or contestation—with the growing field of California Studies, itself.

Applicants may apply for a maximum of $5,000. Additional funding (up to another $5,000) is available for a digitizing or archival component and plans for technological infrastructure designed to assist in the bridging of the substantive geographical and cultural distances the regions face. Awards will be granted for the 2010-11 academic year (July 1 to June 30) and are contingent upon available funding. UCHRI funds must be spent in accordance with all applicable UC rules and regulations. Please contact the Office of Research at your campus with any questions you may have.

Criteria:
Applications for Regional Seminars and Research Workgroups will be evaluated on several criteria: creating new and sustainable networks of scholars and communities; developing existing infrastructures; and expanding the university's commitment to California Studies.

Proposals will also be evaluated for scholarly merit, originality, purpose, relationship to existing research, theoretical framework and methodology, adequacy of available resources, justification for the budget, anticipated scholarly and/or creative products, tentative schedule, and plan for dissemination of the research results. While "collaboration" is broadly defined and need not be required in every aspect of the research, collaborative projects should be aimed at facilitating, whenever possible, long-term ties between the UC, other institutions and organizations, and individuals throughout California and beyond. Projects should enable researchers who have not previously approached California Studies subjects to interact with colleagues who are already experts in the field. Applicants are also encouraged to seek additional outside funding.

Eligibility:
Applicants must be UC faculty members who are eligible to be Principal Investigators on their campuses. A graduate student may participate, but must obtain sponsorship from a faculty member who will have budgetary and project oversight responsibilities. All successful applicants must maintain eligibility during the life of the grant. Grants are not transferable to non-UC institutions. Each applicant may submit no more than one proposal per annual competition cycle.

Note:
1:2 Cost-sharing requirement: Funding is contingent on your securing matching monies from outside granting agencies and/or your home campus. At least one dollar of cost-sharing must be documented for every two dollars of UCHRI funds spent (for example, for a UCCSC/UCHRI grant of $5,000, award recipients must obtain a minimum of an additional $2,500).

More information about UCCSC

To Apply
pplications must be submitted through the online FASTAPPS system (e-mailed, mailed, or faxed applications will not be accepted). Applicants must be registered with the online application system. Basic information as well as uploaded documents such as a project proposal, project bibliography, cv, and itemized budget are required. Graduate Student Applicants must also provide the name of their advisor, who will then be asked by the UCCSC committee to provide a letter of endorsement on the applicant's behalf.

The highlighted tab at the top of each form indicates the current section of the online application. Once you click the "Submit" button at the bottom of a form, the FASTAPPS system automatically advances to the next section and the corresponding tab at the top of the new form becomes highlighted. To move from field to field, use only the Tab key (not the Enter/Return key, which has the same function as the "Submit" button) or click on the field with your mouse.

You may return to your application and make changes at any time prior to the application deadline.

For technical assistance, contact techsupport@hri.uci.edu.
For programmatic questions, contact dnoto@hri.uci.edu.