A number of Carleton research projects received a boost from the Canadian government’s Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) earlier this week in the form of public grants.
“They’re very prestigious—only about 50 per cent of applications are funded,” explained Carleton researcher James Milner, a recipient of one of the SSHRC’s $25,000 Connection grants. “What the adjudication board was looking for were very developed, thoughtful, and well-articulated proposals to dedicate public funds toward.”
Totalling $750,000, the grants given to Carleton will be directed into multiple fields of research, including global Indigenous studies, military oversight and control, and Milner’s area of expertise: refugee policy.
The assistant professor of political science has acted quickly in putting his $25,000 grant to work, bringing to life his vision of a Carleton-hosted workshop on global refugee policy.
“We’ve been able to create an intimate setting with the workshops, including 45 experts,” said Milner, whose “Power and Influence in the Global Refugee Regime” convention runs from Sep. 23 to 25 on campus. “We’ll be linking by video to refugee studies experts at Oxford, York University, and the Institute at Georgetown.”
In keeping with the public nature of its funding, Milner’s workshop will be available to the public in the form of a video viewing at elsewhere on campus. The public will not be able to contribute to the workshop itself, which got underway Wednesday morning.
The recipient of the SSHRC’s largest Carleton-designated grant is research professor Fraser Taylor. The director of Carleton’s Geomatics and Cartographic Research Centre, Taylor received a departmental Insight Grant worth $450,000 and said he plans to use it to further his faculty’s work in the discipline of aboriginal studies.
“This five-year grant will allow us to build on our excellent partnership with First Nations people,” said Taylor, who earned the grant with a proposal relating to the mapping of residential schools. “It will . . . contribute to an increased understanding of a dark chapter in Canadian history.”
Other professors to benefit from the grants include Katherine Graham and Stephen Saideman for their work on First Nations and global military oversight research respectively.
“War is too important to be left to the generals,” said Saideman, the Paterson Chair in International Affairs at Carleton. “Overseeing the military is perhaps too important to be left to presidents—this grant will fund travel for interviews and the training of graduate students.”
The SSHRC unveils the benefactors of its two initiatives—the Insight Program and its Connection grants—on a quarterly basis. Last year, the government organization awarded more than $345-million in scholarships, accepting 30 per cent of all applications.
