African Poetry Digital Humanities Grant 2026: Get Up to $10,000 for Digital Scholarship

If you work with African poetry — whether your interest is oral performance, manuscript archives, contemporary slam culture, or translation practices — this grant is designed to fund the digital work that brings those materials into new life. The African Poetry Digital Humanities Grant 2026, supported by the Andrew Mellon Foundation through the African Poetry Digital Portal Project, offers awards up to $10,000 for one-year projects that place African poetry at the center of a digital-humanities inquiry.

This is not a general research stipend. The grant wants projects that apply computing or digital research methods to questions about African poetry: building searchable corpora, encoding performance texts with time-aligned audio, creating annotation platforms, developing tools for transcription and analysis, or designing public-facing exhibits that make archival materials accessible to broader communities. Think concrete deliverables, honest timelines, and methods that demonstrate both technical competence and deep respect for poetic practices.

Below you’ll find a clear, practical guide: who should apply, what you can budget for, what reviewers will likely value, and how to craft an application that stands out. Read this and you’ll be able to start drafting a competitive proposal today.

At a Glance

Why this grant matters — three short reasons

First: small grants like this do real work. Ten thousand dollars isn’t meant to fund a lifetime of research, but it will pay for focused digital development: digitizing a neglected archive, hiring a transcriber or developer for a prototype, purchasing time on a server, or contracting closed-captioning for recorded performances.

Second: this funding is explicitly about method as much as subject. Projects must use digital research techniques — computational text analysis, digital editions, metadata creation, interactive exhibits — and center African poetry. That requirement pushes applicants to think about reproducible workflows, sustainable hosting, and accessible outputs.

Third: the grant ties you to a public-facing resource. Successful applicants are expected to expand the reach and usefulness of the African Poetry Digital Portal. This means your work has the potential to be used by educators, performers, and other scholars long after the grant year ends.

What This Opportunity Offers (200+ words)

This grant provides modest but strategic funding tailored to the early-stage digital projects that are often overlooked by larger foundations. The money can cover things that make digital scholarship possible and visible: short-term help from a developer to set up a web interface, fees for digitization or high-quality audio capture, costs for transcription and time-aligned annotation, server or hosting charges for a year, software licenses that are not freely available, and honoraria for community collaborators or performers.

You should treat the award as a seed: a way to produce a polished prototype, a dataset, or a public deliverable that demonstrates feasibility and value. The expectation is that the project will reach a concrete endpoint within 12 months — a working prototype, an annotated corpus, a documented methodology, or a small public platform integrated with the Portal. Reviewers look for deliverables that are both scholarly (clear research questions, sound methods) and shareable (open metadata, clear documentation, and pathways for reuse).

Beyond money, there’s intellectual cachet. Being associated with the African Poetry Digital Portal signals that your work connects to a broader infrastructure and community. If your proposal is clearly aligned with Portal resources, it gains credibility; if you can show how your project will add value to that public resource — new texts, improved metadata, technical workflows — that’s a win.

Who Should Apply (200+ words)

This grant is open to a wide range of researchers: faculty members, postdoctoral scholars, research librarians, cultural heritage professionals, independent researchers with institutional hosting, and — in many cases — advanced graduate students working under supervision. If you have a focused digital humanities plan where African poetry is central, you are a candidate.

Practical examples of good fits: a scholar who wants to build a TEI-encoded corpus of a regional oral repertoire with aligned audio; a librarian proposing a searchable database of manuscript poetry with transcription, transliteration, and metadata; an independent researcher designing a web app that supports community annotation of performance texts; or a team that will use computational methods to map stylistic or topical trends across decades of poetry from a particular country.

Think small, precise, and achievable. Proposals that attempt to digitize entire libraries will look unrealistic for a $10,000 award. Instead, aim for a project that can produce demonstrable outputs within a year that others can build on: a cleaned dataset of 500 poems, a prototype interface with documented code, or a public exhibit plus a preservation plan.

If you’re an early-career scholar, this grant can be especially useful: it funds work that can produce pilot data for larger grants, and it demonstrates your ability to manage a technically oriented project. Independent scholars should think about institutional partnerships for hosting and archiving; reviewers will want assurance that deliverables will remain accessible.

Eligibility and Practical Notes

Eligibility is broad — “scholars and researchers” — but reviewers will expect you to show you have the capacity to complete the project. That means showing access to necessary infrastructure or partners (a university library, a digital lab, a community organization). If your project involves recording performers or working with living communities, include ethical considerations, permissions, and compensation plans.

The project must use digital research methods or computing technologies in a humanistic inquiry and place African poetry at the center of the research. Personal computer purchases are explicitly not permitted. You should be prepared to justify any hardware or software costs as necessary to the project and aligned with the 12-month timeline.

Required Materials (150+ words)

The application is compact but exacting. Submit:

• A short abstract (maximum 300 words) summarizing the project, its significance, and the planned deliverable.
• A project proposal not to exceed three pages. This is the core document and should include the project’s guiding premises, a clear overview of structure (components, personnel, tasks), and a concrete statement of what you expect to accomplish in 12 months. Include the nature of the project, the area of African poetry you’ll explore, research questions and approach, technical requirements (specific software, hosting, server time — note: no personal computer purchases), and a detailed timeline with milestones.
• A one-page detailed budget explaining each expense and why it is essential.
• A C.V. for the primary researcher that highlights relevant digital humanities or poetry-related work.

Preparation advice: draft the budget early and run it by your institutional grants office if you have one. For independent researchers, include letters or statements from any partner institution that will host data or provide archival access.

Insider Tips for a Winning Application (300+ words)

1. Scope like a sniper, not a sprinkler. With $10,000 you can do something excellent and focused, not everything. Choose a narrow collection or functionality and do it deeply. A single use-case with polished documentation is worth more than a sprawling incomplete prototype.

2. Show the workflow. Reviewers want to see a reproducible technical path: how you’ll go from raw material to deliverable. Describe tools (e.g., TEI XML, IIIF manifests, Omeka S, Python scripts, R notebooks), version control (Git/GitHub), and where the code and data will live at the end of the project. If you plan to release data or code, state the license and hosting plan.

3. Use Portal resources explicitly. Browse the African Poetry Digital Portal before you write. Name the collections or datasets you’ll use and explain how your project will enhance or connect to them. Projects that plug into existing public infrastructure look far less speculative.

4. Prioritize accessibility and sustainability. Outline a basic plan for long-term access: where the data and interface will be archived (institutional repository, Zenodo, Internet Archive) and how metadata will enable discovery. If you plan to keep a website alive, budget for a year of hosting and show who will maintain it.

5. Budget realistically and justify it. Typical eligible items: transcription fees, quality audio recording, server time, modest developer or research assistant wages, software licenses, fees for digitization or permissions, and honoraria for community collaborators. Disallowed: buying a personal laptop. Spell out hourly rates and deliverables for any contract labor.

6. Demonstrate ethical practice. If the project involves communities, performers, or culturally sensitive materials, include consent procedures and compensation plans. Explain how you’ll handle privacy, intellectual property, and attribution.

7. Deliverables are king. State one or two crisp deliverables — e.g., “A searchable TEI-encoded corpus of 300 performance poems with time-aligned audio and user documentation; code repository; brief methodological white paper.” Concrete outputs make evaluation straightforward.

8. Get outside readers. Share drafts with a technologist, a fellow humanist, and someone not in your field. If a non-specialist can explain your project back to you, your abstract and narrative are likely clear to reviewers.

Application Timeline (150+ words)

Work backward from January 23, 2026. Here’s a realistic schedule:

• Mid–December 2025: Finalize budget and secure any institutional letters or hosting commitments. Confirm any equipment or service quotes.
• Late December 2025: Prepare the project narrative and abstract. Aim to have a full draft two weeks before the deadline so you can get feedback.
• Early January 2026: Circulate your draft to at least three reviewers: one technical, one content-area specialist, and one outside reader. Incorporate feedback.
• One week before deadline: Final proofreading, check that the budget totals match, verify filenames and formats, and confirm your CV is current.
• Submit at least 48 hours before the deadline to avoid last-minute submission hiccups.

If you plan to record performances, complete that work early enough to produce transcripts and fall within the timeline — do not leave recordings to the final month.

What Makes an Application Stand Out (200+ words)

Projects that rise to the top combine scholarly curiosity with practical execution. Reviewers reward proposals that clearly answer these questions: Why this project now? Why is digital work the right method? What will the community gain?

Strong proposals usually demonstrate a deep familiarity with primary materials and the Portal’s holdings. They articulate a plausible technical plan and show prior experience or credible partnerships for any technical work. When you name specific tools and show understanding of tradeoffs (e.g., why TEI over plain text for encoding performance features), you signal competence.

Another standout trait: public-mindedness. Projects that make materials discoverable, usable, and reusable — whether through well-documented datasets, open code, or clear user interfaces — score highly. Explicit plans for metadata standards, persistent identifiers, and archiving increase confidence that your work will survive the grant year.

Finally, pay attention to the human element. If your project engages living poets, communities, or performance traditions, show respect: explain permissions, compensation, and collaborative roles. Ethical, community-centered work is not just preferable — it’s more likely to be supported.

Common Mistakes to Avoid (200+ words)

Assuming scale you can’t achieve. Ambitious visions are not the same as feasible plans. If your timeline reads like a decade-long plan, reviewers will doubt you. Break work into monthly milestones and match budget to effort.

Vague technical details. Saying you’ll “do some analysis” without specifying tools, formats, or deliverables is a red flag. Describe your pipeline: data sources, formats, tools, and expected outputs.

Ignoring rights and permissions. If you plan to publish or host copyrighted poems, show that you have or will obtain permissions. Not dealing with IP issues early can stall a project.

Underbudgeting labor. Digital projects are labor-intensive. If the budget assumes all technical work will be done for free, reviewers will worry about feasibility. Pay fair wages to transcribers, developers, and collaborators.

Not planning for preservation. A prototype that disappears after the grant year is less valuable. Include plans for archiving data and code in a recognized repository.

Poor writing. If your abstract and narrative are confusing, reviewers may misinterpret your aims. Clear, direct prose matters. Have someone outside your field test your abstract.

Frequently Asked Questions (200+ words)

Q: Can independent scholars apply?
A: Yes, but reviewers will expect a plan for hosting and archiving deliverables. If you don’t have institutional affiliation, secure a partner institution (library, archive, digital humanities center) that will host data and include a letter or statement of support.

Q: Are international applicants eligible?
A: The call is aimed at scholars and researchers; it does not specify citizenship limitations. International applicants should clarify hosting and archiving arrangements and ensure any collaborators are included in project planning.

Q: Can funds pay for travel to archives or fieldwork?
A: Generally yes, travel for research and digitization is a permissible expense. Include clear justifications and realistic cost estimates in your budget.

Q: Can I buy software or cloud hosting?
A: Software licenses and server time are acceptable when justified. Don’t budget for a new personal computer; that’s disallowed. Include vendor quotes where helpful.

Q: What about community partners and honoraria?
A: Honoraria for artists, community partners, or consultants are appropriate and strengthen applications, provided they are detailed and reasonable in the budget.

Q: Will I have to report after the grant?
A: Expect to provide final deliverables and a report documenting outcomes. Include plans for documentation and evaluation in your proposal.

Q: Can a team apply?
A: Yes. The proposal should describe personnel roles, time commitment, and who will be responsible for technical and scholarly components.

Q: If I’m not funded, can I resubmit?
A: Most programs allow reapplication; use reviewer feedback to revise. The portal may provide public guidelines and contact points for questions.

Next Steps — How to Apply (100+ words)

If this sounds like your project, start now. Draft your 300-word abstract and a clear three-page narrative that answers: what you will do, why it matters for African poetry, how digital methods will be used, who will do the work, and what you will deliver in 12 months. Build a realistic budget and secure hosting or institutional support if needed. Share drafts with peers — especially someone technical — and be ready to explain your methods plainly.

Ready to apply? Visit the official submission page to read the full guidelines and submit your materials. Apply by January 23, 2026 and submit early to avoid submission errors. Good proposals are specific, respectful of communities and texts, and show a credible path from idea to deliverable.

Apply Now

Ready to apply? Visit the official opportunity page and submit your proposal here:
https://africanpoetrybookfund.submittable.com/submit/225152/african-poetry-digital-portal-digital-humanities-grant

If you have questions about eligibility, technical concerns, or portal integration, consult the project page first and then contact the program staff listed on that site for clarification. Good luck — and may your project make the poetry more available, more traceable, and more meaningful for scholars and communities alike.