Stephanie Carlisle ’05 received a fellowship from the Thomas J. Watson Foundation this month that will fund a year-long study on architecture in Mongolia, India, and Ireland.
Carlisle is one of 50 college seniors across the country to receive the grant this year.
“I can’t think of anything I would rather be doing next year,” Carlisle said. “[The fellowship] is an absolute gift.”
Specifically, Carlisle will be examining architecture in nomadic communities in these countries in a study entitled “The Practice of Movement: Nomadic Domestic Architecture.” According to Carlisle, scholarship on the architecture of nomadic peoples is scarce. Her research will be looking at “vernacular architecture”—such as houses and tents—and studying the relation nomadic peoples have to their homes.
“[Most things] about their lives are completely different from the lives of settled peoples,” Carlisle said. “There is a political dimension to the project, too. You can’t address these people’s political issues with nationalism or borders. In some countries, the government will build permanent homes for these communities, and they will only sojourn in these homes. No one is asking, why this is happening?”
Though Carlisle has not studied nomadic architecture before, her project is an extension of research interests she has developed over the past eight years. She majored in religion and spent the last two years taking courses on architecture. Carlisle also took a year off after her sophomore year to live in Nepal and study the oral tradition of Tibetan storytellers.
Carlisle, who finished her coursework last semester, is currently working in New York City on a construction project renovate a Victorian building.
According to Carlisle, one of the most difficult parts of the application for her was proposing a specific topic to investigate.
“Opportunities were wide open to find something that no one else has done before,” Carlisle said. “Its the hardest thing because you can study virtually anything.”
Other recipients, whose projects were all announced publicly by the foundation, are focusing on topics as varied as accordion folk music, global diffusion through basketball and AIDS education.
The application process, Carlisle added, was also a learning process.
“A huge amount of work went into putting it together,” Carlisle said. “It’s an intense but amazing process. It pushed me to [earnestly] say, ‘What do you want to do when you leave Wesleyan?’ By the time my proposal was done, it helped me know I wanted to work outside of the country after graduation.”
The Watson Foundation is a one-year grant for graduating seniors to conduct an independent study outside of the United States. According to the Watson website, most recipients travel to three or more countries. They receive a $22,000 stipend for the year.
The Foundation has mandated that all this year’s recipients leave the country by August 1. Carlisle said that before she departs for her first destination, she will spend most of the summer learning South-East Asian languages at the language institute at the University of Wisconsin—Madison.
During her year abroad, Carlisle said that she will be living in the communities she plans to study. One of her concerns is to take an ethical approach to her field work.
“[Part of the process] is identifying what my own ethics are and what I am trying to contribute to them,” she said. “It is also important to get the consent of the community and make sure that your research is something that they want to talk about.”
In the end, Carlisle hopes to be able to share any information that she collects with organizations in Ireland and South-East Asia that work with nomadic communities.
The Watson Foundation, Carlisle stressed, does not insist that its fellows produce any kind of end product. Instead the Watson Foundation emphasizes the experience of the study.
For more information about the Watson grant, students can contact Dean Louise Brown. There will be an information session for juniors on April 14 in PAC.
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