The Climate Museum’s mission is to inspire action on the climate crisis with programming across the arts and sciences that deepens understanding, builds connections, and advances just solutions.
The Climate Museum seeks applications from humanities scholars who wish to engage the public on climate change and inequality, to fill two two-year full-time Post-Doctoral Fellowships funded by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. The Fellowships will run from August 1, 2022 to July 31, 2024.
The Climate Museum is the first museum in the U.S. dedicated to climate change. Its mission is to inspire action on the climate crisis with programming across the arts and sciences that deepens understanding, builds connections, and advances just solutions. The Museum’s interdisciplinary work—including exhibitions, art installations, workshops, panels, and more—offers our New York City, domestic, and international constituencies creative and inclusive on-ramps to address climate change and creates space for a broad civic response to the climate emergency. The Museum also has extensive experience partnering with a diverse range of organizations to present public programs that build on the power of communal and artistic interventions.
The Mellon Post-Doctoral Fellows in Climate and Inequality will serve on the leadership team responsible for the development and implementation of exhibitions at Governors Island in 2022, 2023 and 2024 and will integrate a climate humanities and justice framework throughout our programming, including the Museum’s arts interventions and ongoing lectures and panels. Fellows will be encouraged to propose and help implement new approaches to engaging the public on issues of climate and inequality.
The Mellon Fellowships are open to all candidates who have received their PhD in the humanities within the last five years and who have experience in climate and inequality. The Fellows will be in residence at the Museum full-time from August 2022 through July 2024, during which period they will become a key member of the Museum’s public engagement team. The Museum’s office is located in New York City; full vaccinations and in-person presence are required.
These Fellowships offer the opportunity to receive hands-on immersive experience developing and expanding public engagement strategy for the first museum in the United States dedicated to climate change. The positions offer an exceptional opportunity for Fellows to work at the intersection of climate and justice in a museum setting, supporting our initiative to meet the rising public demand for pathways into climate engagement and action.
The fellowships include a stipend of $73,000 a year, as well as health and dental insurance. Applications are due by March 25, 2022, and Fellows will begin work on August 1, 2022. The Museum offers relocation assistance and a modest research budget to Fellows. The Museum will not sponsor applicants for work visas.
Responsibilities
The Fellows will support the expansion of the Museum’s engagement of the public on climate change, with a particular focus on the role of the humanities in justice-centered climate programming, through research and exhibition development. Fellows will have the opportunity to develop their public engagement skills and advance the work of an initiative at a formative moment of growth potential.
After a training program on current best practices in climate communications and the Climate Museum’s approach to pedagogy, engagement, and outreach, with additional topics to be added based on Fellows’ backgrounds, Fellows will begin developing public engagement content and outreach. Their responsibilities will include:
- Supporting the development of adjacent public programming for the Climate Museum’s 2022 exhibition, which will focus on climate and inequality
- Playing a central role in the planning and executing of the Climate Museum’s 2023 and 2024 exhibitions at Governor’s Island
- Integrating an understanding of the intersections of climate and inequality throughout the Museum’s work, with a particular focus on developing adjacent public programming around our spring and fall arts interventions and our interdisciplinary programming
- Conducting ongoing research on best practices for public engagement and outreach concerning the climate crisis and in particular its intersections with issues of inequality and justice
- Envisioning and proposing new justice-oriented programs for the Museum
The Mellon Post-Doctoral Fellows will collaborate closely with members of the Museum’s public engagement team, including our Director, Director of Education and Engagement, Senior Exhibitions Associate, Design and Curatorial Associate, and Special Assistant for Operations.
Qualifications
All applicants must:
- Be recipients of a PhD degree in the humanities after June 2017 and before June 2022
- Be able to work from the Climate Museum’s New York City office with periodic visits to Governors Island and other programming locations from August 2022 - July 2024.
- Have a keen eye toward the role of the environmental humanities in expanding public engagement with climate change
- Have an academic background informed by historical inquiry and subject-matter expertise in climate, inequality, or both
- Have a strong orientation towards collaboration
- Have an ambitious mindset and excellent time management skills
- Be inclined to kindness and humor under pressure
Application Process
Applications are due on March 25, 2022.
Application materials should be submitted via the Climate Museum’s application portal on Submittable, and should include the following:
- A cover letter detailing why you are a strong candidate and why this would be a good fit for you as well as the Climate Museum
- A Curriculum Vitae
- A 2-page single-spaced proposal outlining the public engagement work and research you would propose to conduct at the Climate Museum
You must also provide two confidential letters of referral. References should email letters of referral to careers@climatemuseum.org with the subject line “Mellon Post-Doctoral Reference Letter for [Your Name]. If you have experience doing public engagement work, or work around climate and/or inequality, one letter of reference should come from a person familiar with that work.
The Climate Museum highly values diversity and views the climate crisis as a social justice crisis. People of color, Indigenous people, people with disabilities, and people who identify as members of the LGBTQIA+ community are particularly encouraged to apply.