Malinowski Masson Residence Fellowship Program

Summary

Topic Scholarship — Malinowski Masson Residence Fellowship Program
When Feb 19, 2026 to Apr 16, 2026 (Europe/Berlin / UTC100)
Where Bolzano — Italy
URL https://mfea.projects.unibz.it/
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Description

The Malinowski Masson Residence Fellowship program announces the opening of its call for applications for a residency in autumn 2026. The Malinowski Masson Fellowship offers a six-week residency period in Oberbozen-Soprabolzano, South Tyrol, designed for social and cultural anthropologists to complete projects based on anthropological research. This Fellowship is funded by the Stiftung Südtiroler Sparkasse and supported by the Malinowski family, the Malinowski Forum for Ethnography and Anthropology (Free University of Bozen-Bolzano), and the Anthropological Association South Tyrol (evaa). The residency takes place in the villa in which Malinowski and his family lived in the 1920s and 30s, located on the scenic Ritten-Renon plateau just above Bozen-Bolzano. The Fellowship honors not only Malinowski’s pioneering work in ethnography and anthropology, but also the role of his first wife, Elsie Masson, who was herself a keen social observer and an important contributor to her husband’s work.

One visiting fellow will be selected from this call for applications. Taking place between mid-October and late November 2026, the residency offers the visiting fellow a space to finalize an anthropological project, which may take various forms: a written publication, audiovisual media, and performative work bridging science and art. During their stay, the fellow will offer a public lecture on their project.

The fellowship stipend provides for:

a six-week stay in the Malinowski Villa;
a daily allowance for board and local transportation (€75/day)*;
round-trip travel to and from the fellow’s habitual work or home location (max. €1000 from within Europe; max. €3000 from outside Europe);
an additional allowance of €1000 for scholars who bring their families.

The fellow is expected to bring their own computers or other equipment needed for their work during the residency. They will have a unibz campus card for access to unibz facilities and the library, plus use of a printer at unibz.

*Although the villa is not ideal for persons with reduced mobility, it is otherwise easily reachable by public transportation (bus, cable car) from the city of Bolzano, which is well connected by train and bus. A private automobile is not necessary, but parking is available for fellows with their own cars.

Eligibility

The Fellowship call is open to scholars who would like to utilize the six-week residency to complete a dissemination output of an anthropological project, therefore the project proposal should represent the final stage of a broader project. Applicants are required to have linguistic competence in any one of the following three languages: English, German or Italian. They should be mid-career or senior scholars, or experienced post-docs. The Fellowship is open to independent or unaffiliated scholars, and applicants from Global South countries are welcome.

To apply:

Applications must be submitted no later than midnight CET, 15 April 2026 to this email address: design-art[ at ]unibz.it

The application must be in English in Word or PDF files, 12-point font, and contain the following:

A cover page with the project title, the applicant’s name, affiliation (if any), and contact information;
An abstract of (250 words max.);
The project proposal (1000 words max.), which should address the content of the proposed work to be carried out during the residency; a short formal description of the residency’s final outcome (e.g. “40-minute Podcast in language X” or “academic article, 10.000 words in English, ready for submission to peer reviewed journal”; the proposal’s feasibility; and its significance as a contribution to anthropology;
A statement of why the residency would be beneficial to the applicant (250 words max.);
The applicant’s updated CV (a maximum of 4 pages, 12-point font).

Timeline:

Call for applications opening: 1 March 2026

Deadline for applications: 15 April 2026

Notification of Fellowship winner: 31 May 2026

For queries, please contact Elisabeth Tauber and Dorothy Zinn: design-art[ at ]unibz.it

Since 2016, the Malinowski Forum for Ethnography and Anthropology (MFEA) at the Free University of Bozen-Bolzano has promoted knowledge about the Malinowskian presence in South Tyrol and has fostered innovative thinking about ethnography and anthropology through various academic and public initiatives. Please see the MFEA website for more information about its activities and resources regarding Bronislaw Malinowski and Elsie Masson: https://mfea.projects.unibz.it/.

Research Project

The MFEA project aims to study the works and lives of Bronislaw Malinowski and Elsie Masson, focusing on their presence in South Tyrol. The research project investigates many issues of the Malinowski-Masson collaboration and the role of their private social network, which includes students and academics but also relatives and friends, in the rise of collective ideas and shared lifestyles that contributed to the development of science, ethnography and anthropology. (For more information, see the page Project).