The History of Ballads as News Media in Australia PhD Scholarship

Applications are invited for a PhD scholarship in The History of Ballads as News Media in Australia. The scholarship is supported by the Australian National University (ANU) and is part of Dr Una McIlvenna's Australian Research Council (ARC) Future Fellowship 2023-2027. The PhD candidate will undertake a project on the use of balladry and ballad competitions in Australian newspaper collections in the 19th century. The candidate will identify, transcribe, index, and analyse news ballads in the National Library of Australia's Trove database of digitised Australian newspapers, analysing them in the context of the project's wider findings from other language and national traditions. The PhD candidate will also upload data regularly to the project's digital platform, continually building their skills in digital humanities. The PhD will be supervised by Dr Una McIlvenna, together with the project team's Digital Humanities Research Associate, offering skills training in literary and historical analysis, digital humanities, research, writing, and database management. The successful candidate will be affiliated with ANU's School of Literature, Languages and Linguistics (SLLL) and will have the opportunity to work closely with members of the project's Advisory Committee, who are specialists in Australian history, balladry, and media history.