The National Endowment for the Humanities announced Wednesday that six grants, totaling $1.01 million, will be awarded to researchers at the University - marking the second largest amount the NEH has awarded to any single institution this spring.
Through supporting projects that explore all aspects of American history, the NEH aims to offer Americans a better understanding of their cultural past.
The NEH offers grants three times each year. Columbia University received $1.3 million - the highest amount this spring.
NEH Spokesman Jim Turner said it is becoming less and less common for an institution to receive over a million dollars.
"It is a tribute to the quality and national importance of work being done at the University," Turner said.
Edward F. Gaynor, Jr., associate director of Special Collections at Alderman Library, Assoc. Religious Studies Prof. David F. Germano and Assoc. English Prof. John M. Unsworth all received preservation and access awards.
Unsworth's project will develop an electronic archive of the works of British poet and artist William Blake.
Religious Studies Prof. Benjamin C. Ray, who will study the Salem Witchcraft Papers, and English Prof. Hoyt N. Duggan, who will prepare an archive of all early versions of Piers Plowman, both earned research grants.
English Prof. David L. Vander Meulen received a summer stipend.
Award applicants had to face a competitive process, since the NEH only funds one out of every five projects submitted, Turner said.
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Germano, who received a grant for providing online access to Buddhist literary texts, said he completed his application with the help of University officials. The entire process took about nine months, he said.
Most of the University's grant recipients will use the funds to start Web archives.
Gaynor said the funding he received will go toward putting together a database of materials in eleven special collections libraries throughout the Commonwealth.
He and his colleagues will focus on materials related to blacks in Virginia, he added.
"We are going to give people access to holdings in all these libraries that hadn't been available before," he said.
Germano said he plans to use the grant to fund a new Tibetan and Himalayan information community.
The Digital Library Research and Development Dept. is designing a series of information communities, which would allow Internet users to explore particular interests, Germano said.
He said the Tibetan and Himalayan information community will be one of the first examples of such an endeavor.
Vander Meulen said he will combine his two areas of interest, 18th century English literature and books as physical objects, to examine Alexander Pope's piece "An Essay on Man"
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