The Eugene M. Kayden Awards
These awards, which are funded from the Eugene M. Kayden endowment, are intended to foster and promote publication in the Humanities, research leading to publication, and the celebration and dissemination of excellent published Humanities research. The funds shall be used to promote scholarship and publication in the humanities at CU, across the broad range of humanistic disciplines, including the pursuit of those disciplines in other Colleges.
There are two kinds of awards:
A. Kayden Research Grants
These are awards to foster and promote research, creative works and translations, which have a high probability of issuing in publication. The applicant will submit the following application file:
- A research/publication proposal (maximum 1000 words) which explains the nature and significance of the project, the necessity for the funds, and the likely publication outcome;
- A request for a specific amount together with a one-page budget;
- A complete list of the applicant's publications;
- A letter of support from the Chair of the applicant's department.
The maximum amount for any grant will be $3000. Awards may be for any legitimate research costs associated with the production and publication of original work in the humanities. Travel grants, including grants to finance conference travel, will be considered, provided there is clear evidence that conference attendance will promote or advance the published scholarly work of the applicant. Also eligible is the subvention of manuscript publication, for works that have unusual costs attached. Priority will be given to manuscripts already accepted by major academic presses. The manuscripts must not be textbooks, but may be translations.
For the Fall Research Grants please submit your application by 5:00 pm, Friday, October 16th, 2009 to: Meredith Kroenlein, Assistant to the Associate Deans, 2-24 Old Main.
For the Spring Research Grants please submit your application by 5:00 pm, Friday, February 19th, 2010 to: Meredith Kroenlein, Assistant to the Associate Deans, 2-24 Old Main.
The Research Award Committee will consist of the Associate Dean (Chair) or his or her nominee, together with at least three faculty members designated by the Associate Dean each of whom will serve two-year terms. Those who serve on the Research Award Committee will not be eligible to apply to for Kayden Research Awards during their tenure on the Committee.
B. Kayden Book Awards
Each year two or three broad areas of the Humanities will be invited to submit published monographs for the Kayden Book Award by a UCB faculty member. An awardee will receive a $1000 research account, and their Department will receive a $4000 grant to organize a one-day Author-Meets-Critics Symposium. The Symposium will involve both the author and experts in the author's field who will present critiques of the book to which the author will respond. The symposium will be open to the wider academic community and the public. Funds must be disbursed by the end of the academic year following the award, or returned to the Fund. To be considered the book nominated must have been published within four years of the application. A book may be nominated by the author, or by some other member of the author's department.
The application file will consist of
- a letter of nomination (maximum, 750 words)
- a copy of the book
- a complete list of the nominee's publications;
- other supporting materials (e.g. typically published reviews, but may include solicited outside letters etc).
- 2010: Literary studies (including English literature, non-English literatures and Comparative Literature)
- 2011: Classics, Philosophy, Religious Studies
- 2012: History and the Arts (including Creative Writing, Musicology, Theatre, Dance, Film)
For the Kayden Book Award please submit your application file by 5:00 pm, Friday, March 12, 2010 to: Meredith Kroenlein, Assistant to the Dean, 275 UCB, Old Main.
The Book Award Committee will consist of at least three faculty members nominated by the departments of those disciplines involved in the given year. Members will serve for just one year. Those who serve on the Book Award Committee will not be eligible to be nominated for the Kayden Book Award during their tenure on the committee.
Past winners of the Kayden Book Award
Background to the Eugene M. Kayden Fund
Eugene M. Kayden was born in Russia in 1886. He came to the United States at the age of sixteen, enrolled at UCB in 1908, and graduated in 1912 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in economics. In order to improve his English while he was attending UCB, Kayden worked on translating Russian plays, poems, and other literary works into English. Kayden continued with the advanced study of economics at Princeton and Harvard and embarked on a distinguished career as a scholar and teacher of economics, serving on the faculty of the University of the South in Sewanee, Tennessee, from 1923-1955.
Professor Kayden focused his scholarly pursuits on literature and economics. He held two convictions that were fundamental to his achievements as a translator. He believed that the best way to understand Russia was through her literature, and that cultural understanding was basic to world peace. Professor Kayden always maintained a particular attachment and loyalty to the University of Colorado, the place where his lifelong interest in Russian translation began. His gifts to his alma mater resulted in the creation of the Eugene M. Kayden Fund, the income from which is used for the advancement of the humanities;
The Eugene M. Kayden Fund - comprised of the Kayden Humanities Bequest, the Dora Kayden Gift, and the Eugene M. Kayden Gift – is administered by the University of Colorado Foundation. In 1980 the Kayden Advisory Committee was established and was responsible for advising the Chancellor of the University of Colorado at Boulder on the distribution of the income from the Fund. In 2004 the Fund was transferred by the Chancellor to the College of Arts and Sciences. The Dean of the College assigned the management of the Fund and of the awards to the Associate Dean for Humanities and the Arts. In 2006, the Associate Dean convened a Committee of senior faculty to review the structure of the awards. The Review Committee made recommendations for restructuring the awards to make them more effective in promoting scholarship and publication in the Humanities. While the terms of these gifts are not as clearly documented as they would be now, within the Foundation documents a number of aims are described:
- "to advance humanities by aiding in the publication of deserving works"
- "support faculty publication in the field of the humanities"
- "financial assistance should be granted for creative work and not for textbook writing."
- "subsidize original works in the history of philosophy".
The Review Committee considered these to constitute a broad mandate to foster and promote publication in the Humanities, research leading to publication, and the celebration and dissemination of such excellent published scholarship. The Committee determined that the funds should be used to promote scholarship and publication in the humanities at CU, across the broad range of humanistic disciplines, including the pursuit of those disciplines in other Colleges. With this mandate the Committee approved the above structure for the awards
