Through a generous donation, King’s College Cambridge is able to invite applications for a four-year Research Fellowship from those who are completing or have recently completed a doctorate and who intend to pursue a research project on some aspect of the Silk Road countries, societies, and cultures of Asia from the Western borders of China to the Mediterranean Sea, as well as their relationships with China in the East and Europe in the West. The research project’s discipline may address, amongst other issues, Environmental History, Religion, Art, Maritime History, China before 1911, Ottoman Empire, and Russian Central Asia, but applicants should not feel constrained by this list.

This Research Fellowship is part of a broader programme of studies of the countries of the Silk Roads, which includes lectures, seminars and conferences, as well as graduate scholarships and further Research Fellowships. As well as pursuing their own research project, the successful candidate will be expected to play an active role in developing the programme and in organizing academic activity concerned with the countries of the Silk Road.

This post-doctoral Fellowship is intended to encourage research into the Silk Roads and the countries of the Silk Roads by enabling the successful candidate to complete a substantial research project on their own choosing. Projects may concern any aspect of the countries, societies, and cultures of the Silk Roads, from the Western borders of China to the Mediterranean Sea, and of the Silk Roads themselves, that is to studies of relationships and the movement of materials, knowledge, and technologies between China and the Mediterranean, at any period to the present day.

The ideal candidate for this Research Fellowship will have a strong background in a relevant discipline and be completing or have completed an outstanding doctoral thesis. It is not a requirement that the candidate’s doctoral studies or the work that they submit in support of their application should have concerned questions of the Silk Roads specifically, but candidates will be expected to show in their applications both how their future work relates to the work that they have already done. The successful candidate will be expected to engage broadly with the whole college community.

Graduates of any university are eligible. Candidates will usually have completed their PhD but must not have undertaken more than 3 years of postdoctoral work by 1 October 2023 (i.e. your PhD cannot have been granted before 30 September 2020).