We are a growing international community of independent scholars, founded by Marie Léger-St-Jean and Simon Rosenberg. We’re dedicated to helping each other out.
Do you consider yourself a researcher / scholar / academic (within literary & cultural studies / the humanities / book history / book studies / library and information science) and you are not (or no longer) affiliated with an institution? Then you should consider joining us!
Scholarship doesn’t need to be solitary
We provide some of the social aspects that you’d get from working for a university, library or research centre. They should not be neglected, and therefore, it is important for us to further offer:
- a community of like-minded researchers who are eager to hear about your projects and talk about theirs;
- networking possibilities;
- a routine and accountability to help you stay focused on your projects, if you’d like;
- a (digital) place where you can say “hi” in the morning, get and give help or advice, and go chat by the (virtual) water-cooler, like colleagues do.
You can do research outside of academia
Is your university contract running out? Have you finished your PhD and want to continue doing research, but not sure about a university career? There is still a place for you in scholarship.
Some organizations are very welcoming to independent researchers. Some grants are even open to unaffiliated scholars. In addition to providing community to well-established independent researchers, we’re also here to smooth the landing for those in that uncomfortable purgatory between life inside and outside of academic institutions.
Tips on setting up shop
Especially if an affiliation just ended, you may not realise yet that you have taken all the advantages this affiliation offered for granted. You will slowly come to notice that you might lose important aspects like:
- access to vital digital sources and databases (e.g. OED, Early English Books Online, Eighteenth Century Collections Online, etc.);
- access to otherwise expensive software solutions (e.g. Adobe Acrobat);
- a secure and professional-looking e-mail address (with sufficient storage space);
- a secure and reliable cloud system (also with sufficient storage space);
- templates for presentations, letters, etc.
And there is so much more! The idea of our international “Independent Scholars” community is to help each other out by offering our experience, collecting ideas and solutions for the myriad issues that we face as we try—and succeed!—in continuing our work without institutional support.
Further, if you are not paid for your research, it is still necessary to pay the bills. With our combined experiences, we can make suggestions for freelance work, tax situations and much more, and for several countries (at the moment Canada, Germany, UK and USA). We are also here to offer suggestions for job applications and share postings people might find interesting.
Join us
All we ask of you is to participate and pay it forward in our community. So sign in, spread the word and make our community a little bit stronger!
Just email indy.scholars.community_at_gmail.com and we’ll take it from there.