On April 28, 2021, Elizabeth Ananat, Mallya Professor of Women and Economics at Barnard College, was named an Andrew Carnegie Fellow as part of the 2021 class. Ananat will receive philanthropic support for a research sabbatical in the humanities and social sciences to address an important and enduring issue confronting our society. From more than 300 nominations, just 26 distinguished scholars and writers were selected for this prestigious honor by the Carnegie Corporation of New York, a philanthropic foundation that has supported the advancement of education and knowledge for more than a century. Each of the winners is awarded a scholarship of up to $200,000 — the most generous stipend of its kind, nicknamed “the brainy awards” — after a panel of jurors, which includes the nation’s most distinguished scholars and intellectual leaders, selects proposals from a pool of the top applications that underwent a preliminary, anonymous evaluation by subject-matter experts.
The fellows, who will conduct original, high-impact research on timely topics such as law enforcement, pandemic recovery, voting access, racial justice, rural opportunity, the “Me Too” movement, immigration, and climate change, are expected to use this support to produce a book or major study over the next couple of years. In Ananat’s case, this award will fund scholarly work on the intergenerational dynamics of poverty and inequality.