Routledge/Round Table Commonwealth Studentships - Association of Commonwealth Universities

The Studentships

The PhD studentships provide support for research projects on Commonwealth related themes. Two studentships are available each year, one for UK-registered students and one for Commonwealth students in other countries.

The studentships have a value of GBP 5,500 each.

Proposed research must fulfil at least one of the below criteria:

Relate to the Commonwealth as a whole or to any Commonwealth-wide institution or organisation
Have a strong Commonwealth comparative aspect
Be of relevance to a Commonwealth country other than the UK.

For example, a research project comparing LGBT rights in South Africa and Uganda would be eligible, as would a project on the reform of colonial-era anti-LGBT legislation in India, but a project on the role of Stonewall in advocating for LGBT rights in the UK would not.

Applications are welcomed from a broad range of disciplines in the humanities and social sciences, but preference may be given to disciplines usually covered by the Round Table journal, including (but not exclusively) politics, international relations, economics, international history, geography, law, development studies, and area studies.

The studentships are funded by The Round Table: The Commonwealth Journal of International Affairs and the journal's publisher, Routledge, in association with the ACU.

Eligibility

The first studentship is open to registered PhD students from UK universities, although not necessarily UK citizens.

The second is open to registered PhD students from ACU member universities in Commonwealth counties other than the UK, and to Chevening and Commonwealth Scholarship alumni who are PhD students at any Commonwealth university outside the UK.

Mentorship

As part of the studentship, applicants are required to identify and work with a mentor at an ACU member university in a country other than their own. This should be an expert in a subject linked to the applicant’s subject of research, who will be able to provide support and advice during the studentship. Before applying, applicants are encouraged to informally approach at least one potential mentor and, if their application is successful, will then be required to obtain a letter of support from their mentor to agree to the mentorship before their studentship is confirmed.

The role of the mentor

The mentor will be expected to hold a minimum of two virtual meetings with the student during the period of the studentship. They will be expected to be in contact with the student by email to share their experiences in their relevant field, provide advice around publishing, events and trends in their field, and to challenge and empower the student to consider new ways of thinking.

The mentor will also be expected to contribute to either the podcast or the article and will be paid an honorarium of GBP 500, payable at the end of the studentship. Mentors must read and abide by the mentor code of conduct guidelines.

Mentor code of conduct guidelines

The relationship between mentor and mentee should not be exploitative in any way, nor open to misinterpretation
Mentors are responsible for setting and keeping appropriate boundaries that govern interactions with mentees
Mentors should maintain a clear mentoring relationship with mentees and not allow personal bias to influence their actions
Mentors should maintain confidentiality, objectivity and equal partnership
The mentor’s role is to respond to the mentee’s needs and agenda rather than imposing their own agenda
Mentors will share the responsibility for creating a smooth end to the relationship with the mentee, once it has achieved its purpose
Any personal data relating to the mentee held by the mentor should be deleted as soon as it is no longer needed.

How to apply

Applications are now closed for 2022.

Post-studentship requirements

Successful applicants will be required to submit, no more than twelve months after the take-up of the award, an article of between 4,000 and 6,000 words based on their research, for consideration for publication in the Round Table journal. Successful applicants will also be required to make a podcast on their research, for publication on the journal’s website.

Timeline

Deadline for applications: July 2022
Announcement of winners: September 2022
Take-up of awards: 1 November 2022 to July 2023

Contact us

If you have a query which is not answered here, please contact alex.may@oup.com

Meet the award winners

2021-22

Elza D’Cruz

Elza is a doctoral candidate at the Manipal Academy of Higher Education (MAHE), based at the Srishti Manipal Institute of Art, Design and Technology, India. Her research looks at the public garden as a space of negotiation between the colonial and the locals in Bangalore under British rule.

Elza plans to use the Routledge/Round Table Commonwealth Studentship to investigate how the colonial circulation of plants and garden ideas to Bangalore from other parts of the British Empire- such as Australia - shaped the public garden practice in Bangalore. She also intends to investigate the nature of the agency of the local people and land in the making of these landscapes by recording the oral histories of local gardening communities and the mapping of gardens.

2020-21

Rob Cullum

Rob is currently a PhD researcher at Aberystwyth University’s International Politics Department. His current research focuses on the naval response to climate change in the United Kingdom, Australia, and the United States, seeking to understand how organisational forces shape each navy’s response.

Rob is using the Routledge/Round Table Commonwealth Studentship award to fund several purposes. His main aim will be to produce a research piece for The Round Table comparing Britain and Australia’s military and humanitarian activities among small island states in the Caribbean and the South Pacific. If the international health situation permits, he will also pursue fieldwork in the US to help better set the context for this piece and for his PhD work, through interviewing naval officials and experts.

Navida Bachan

Navida is undertaking a PhD in Governance at the Sir Arthur Lewis Institute of Social and Economic Studies, University of the West Indies, St. Augustine, Trinidad. Her PhD research investigates health system governance and its impact on the performance of health systems within the context of Trinidad and Tobago, and in relation to the United Kingdom.

Navida will be using the Routledge/Round Table Commonwealth Studentship award towards understanding key governance components within the United Kingdom’s National Health Service. Specifically, her study of the NHS will begin with a review of key legislation, and culminate in interviews with health officials. She envisions her findings being translated into policy measures that contribute towards the overall strengthening of the Trinidad and Tobago health system as well as those of developing countries more generally.