Bloomsbury Academic Writing Fellowship 2024

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About Bloomsbury Academic Writing Fellowship

The purpose of the Bloomsbury Academic Writing Fellowship 2024 is to help early career academics get their book idea into a form which is ready for publication. If you are of African or African Caribbean heritage, based in the UK, and have an idea you would like to develop into an academic book but are unsure where to start, this Fellowship is for you.

The recipient of the Fellowship will receive a package of creative support throughout 2025. This will include editorial support and mentorship for one year, £1,000 of financial support, practical resources, and event and networking opportunities. The ultimate goal of this invaluable, industry-standard package of support is for the author to develop their work to a point in which they feel in a position to begin approaching prospective publishers.

Thematic Areas

• Relevant United Nations Sustainable Development goal/s
• Gender and sexuality
• Economics and international development
• Social welfare, society and communities
• Politics, current affairs and government
• Equality and diversity
• Climate and environment
• History and cultural heritage
• Popular culture and media
• Literary studies

• Sponsor Organisation: Bloomsbury Publishing

Benefits of Bloomsbury Academic Writing Fellowship

The successful recipients of the Fellowship will receive a package of creative support throughout 2025. This will include:

1. Editorial support and mentorship:

• A bespoke mentoring programme offering industry-standard creative support (and unique insight into working with a publisher). This will be managed by Writers & Artists and Bloomsbury and will include milestone editorial meetings throughout the year. (Mentor to be appointed based on the Fellowship recipient's field of work, career history and aspirations, as well as shared experiences and challenges). A typical one-year mentoring programme includes four milestone meetings of one-hour between mentor and mentee. Submission deadlines will be agreed before each of these sessions, with mentees expected to submit a tranche of original writing (to an agreed word count) in advance so that their mentor can prepare accordingly. Each one-hour meeting will be used to discuss progress, editorial suggestions and next steps. Mentors will offer a short follow-up report outlining everything discussed within the session. Where possible, they will encourage that at least one of the milestone meetings takes place in-person at Bloomsbury Publishing.

2. Financial support:

• The Fellowship will offer £1,000 in financial support to the recipient at the start of the fellowship year

3. Events and networking opportunities:

• Registration to a UK-based academic conference attended by Bloomsbury in 2025
• A complimentary place on Writing Non-Fiction, a five-week online course from Writers & Artists
• A complimentary place at any appropriate Writers & Artists events taking place in 2025
• An invitation to attend all appropriate relevant Bloomsbury Academic author events
• Invitations to participate in any relevant
• Bloomsbury Academic fellowship panels, recordings or events
• The option of a thirty-minute one-to-one consultation with a literary agent, who will provide proposal feedback and marketplace insight

4. Resources:

• Full access to Writers' & Artists' online listings: a one-year subscription to a database of thousands of industry contacts
• £250 of Bloomsbury Academic titles

Bloomsbury Academic Writing Fellowship Requirements

• Be of Black African or African Caribbean heritage;
• Be over 18 and living in the UK;
• Not have a publishing contract or agent for the proposed work.

Application Date and Process

To apply for the Fellowship, all entrants must:

• Provide a short statement (maximum 200 words) about how their work aims to educate and inspire one of the following UN Sustainable Development Goals or a key thematic topic from across the Humanities and Social Sciences such as: Gender and sexuality; Economics and international development; Social welfare, society and communities; Politics, current affairs and government; Equality and diversity; Climate and environment; History and cultural heritage; Popular culture and media; Literary studies
• Provide a provisional Table of Contents and projected word count
• Provide a 200-word synopsis of the work
• Upload a 1,000-1,500 word sample extract of the work
• Have an account with writersandartists.co.uk, which is free to create

Click on the link to the application website to get started. 

Application Deadline

10 November, 2024

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