The Barnard Zora Neale Hurston Grant

From 2025 to 2028, Barnard will commemorate 100 years since Zora Neale Hurston, Class of 1928, first enrolled at the College, and in honor of the centennial of Black students at Barnard. The College envisions this interdisciplinary, multiyear project as a way to engage with Hurston’s texts and her methodologies and to explore her legacy in Harlem and beyond through courses for students, faculty seminars, undergraduate research, and archival projects, with the hope of learning more about the opportunities and challenges for Hurston and the students who followed in her footsteps at Barnard.

The impact of Zora Neale Hurston in academia, the arts, the African Diaspora, and American life in the 20th century can’t be overstated. This three-year experience will transform Barnard by excavating and centering the historical legacies of Hurston and 100 years of Black culture at Barnard, via histories and stories from people, archives, and texts, contextualizing them in extensive scholarship on racial, gender, and class politics, and sharing them with the extended community in immediate and sustained ways.

The Barnard Zora Neale Hurston Committee invites proposals from students, faculty, staff, and graduates to shape the centennial celebration over the next three years. The ZNH Grant will fund projects and events that advance this work across our community.

You are invited to submit a proposal that celebrates Hurston’s legacy, and that brings together distinct constituencies for discussion and relationship building, as well as other programming and initiatives that foster inclusion and belonging at Barnard. 

All projects should clearly connect to the goals of celebrating Zora Neale Hurston’s legacy, including the work of other Black graduates such as Ntozake Shange ‘70, Thulani Davis, and Edwidge Danticat ‘90, among others, and 100 years of Black students at Barnard.

Suggested areas of concentration for initiatives or programming may be: 

1. Projects that engage with Hurston's legacy as a writer and scholar
2. Visual artwork 
3. Theatrical productions, dance, or performance projects 
4. Seminars and workshops on Hurston’s legacy

These grants will carry a maximum award of $2,500 per semester. 

We encourage community members to submit proposals for programming initiatives from Spring 2026 to Spring 2028. Proposals may span a single semester, such as Spring 2026, or be planned in the future in a single semester (Spring 2027) or across multiple semesters (Fall 2026 - Spring 2027).

Grantees will receive mentoring and support from the Office of Inclusion & Belonging as they pursue their projects.

This grant fund, administered through the ZNH Committee, is open to all Barnard faculty, staff, students, and graduates. 

Examples of current and past projects that could be included:

• Weaving Dreams is a collaboration across students, faculty and graduates. This exhibition showcases handmade quilts and other textile artifacts selected from the oeuvre of quilting artist and Barnard professor of Africana Studies and Literature, Kim F. Hall, curated alongside pieces by Barnard graduate Carter Watts ‘25 in the Milstein Lobby and throughout the Barnard Library from October 2025 through June 2026.
  
  This display, inspired by Zora Neale Hurston’s legacy and the College’s commemoration of “100 years of Black Students at Barnard” will invite viewers to interact with and contribute to an array of textile works that speak to the experiences of Black women in academia across many generations. A quilt by Dindga McCannon, “ZORA! For B.O.S.S.” accompanies a set of wardrobed figures, created by Olutomisin Fasosin '25, representing icons of Black Barnard style through the ages, including Zora, Ntozake Shange ‘70, Sydnie Mosley ’07, and Khepera Lyons - Clark ’24, telling a story about the ways students and graduates have used clothing project Black identity at Barnard over the years. 
  
  This exhibition will feature a kick-off celebration with a performance on October 3, 2025, at 6:00pm, in the Milstein Lobby, led by Sydnie Mosley ‘07, graduates and affiliated faculty. 

• The Black @ Barnard Project by Corinth Jackson

• How It Feels To Be Colored Me, an immersive experience celebrating Zora Neale Hurston’s epic multitudes curated by Roselyn Juma ‘25 and Eleni Mazareas ‘25. 

• Members of the Shange Magic Project launched The Love Space Demands: Sharing the Words of Ntozake Shange in the Barnard Library, which supported a series of translations of Shange's works that were made by students and published in digital zine format.

• Field Trip to see the Broadway production of for colored girls who have considered suicide / when the rainbow is enuf by Ntozake Shange ‘70

Proposals will be submitted via Google Form and must include:

1. Statement of purpose (250–500 words) describing the project, its connection to celebrating 100 years of Black students at Barnard, and whether it is a one-time or recurring effort.
2. Estimate of participants/audience the project expects to reach.
3. Proposed budget.
4. Evaluation plan describing how impact or success will be assessed.
5. Biographies of organizers.

6. Any additional relevant information.

Timeline:

Application Due: 11:59 pm, November 7, 2025

Review of Applications: November–December 2025

Decision Notification: December 12, 2025

Funds Disbursed: Spring 2026 – Spring 2028

The application for the Barnard ZNH Grant can be found here. 

For questions and if you need support with your application, please email inclusion-belonging@barnard.edu

To learn more about the centennial celebration, please check out our website: https://zoracentennial.barnard.edu/

We look forward to reviewing your proposals and to celebrating Zora Neale Hurston’s legacy together with the Barnard community.