Wenner-Gren Foundation - Global Initiatives Grant (2027 round)

The Global Initiatives Grant supports highly innovative projects that address systemic disciplinary needs and create conditions for anthropologists to advance their public work. For the 2026–2030 funding cycles, the call is exclusively dedicated to making a single award for pioneering projects in public anthropology designed to reach broad, non-academic audiences. Rather than funding standard academic field research, this grant finances targeted, high-impact interventions or long-term infrastructure—such as major public media campaigns, training programs, or new platforms for public communication—that bring anthropological perspectives directly into public decision-making.

• Primary Organiser: Must hold a PhD in anthropology or a closely related field at the time of application.
• Institutional Affiliation: Applicants must be affiliated with an educational institution or organisation (such as UNIMA) capable of carrying forward and sustaining the project's long-term infrastructure.
• Prior Grantees: Current Wenner-Gren awardees must fully complete all requirements of their existing project and submit their final reports before applying to this call.
• Compliance: Applicants must comply with U.S. Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) regulations.

The explicit priority area is Public Anthropology, which shares disciplinary knowledge in accessible, pioneering, and socially consequential ways. The foundation places special priority on applications originating from countries, regions, and communities where anthropology as a discipline is structurally disadvantaged or under threat.

• Operational costs for public media campaigns, communication platforms, and public engagement materials.
• Development of training programs designed to teach anthropologists how to communicate with general audiences.
• Essential collaborative travel, tools, materials, and technical support directly tied to executing the public initiative.

• Institutional overhead, administrative management fees, or university taxation.
• Standard academic fieldwork, ethnographic research, or laboratory analysis (which fall under separate foundation programs).
• Project expenses incurred before the official grant start date of January 1 of the following calendar year.

Applications must be submitted electronically through the foundation's online portal:

• Step 1: Access the application portal between March 15 and May 15, 2027
• Step 2: Fill out the online portal fields, providing an abstract and concise answers to six mandatory project questions.
• Step 3: Upload a detailed budget breakdown spreadsheet and up-to-date CVs for the primary applicant and all key collaborators.
• Step 4: Submit the complete application in English. Do not attach unsolicited documents like reference letters, transcripts, or publications, as they will cause automatic disqualification.