Auckland Library Heritage Trust Scholarship 2019/2020

Applications for the Auckland Library Heritage Trust research scholarship are now open!

Ref: Bryan Lowe. Auckland Library Heritage Trust scholar, Aleisha Ward, in the Sir George Grey Special Collections reading room, 2017.

Now in its seventh year, the scholarship is offered by the Auckland Library Heritage Trust to assist with research and the promotion of material held in Sir George Grey Special Collections at Tāmaki Pātaka Kōrero | Central City Library and the distributed Heritage Collections across the region.

Ref: Isabel Hooker. A group of Auckland Tramping Club members outside a hut in the Piha valley, 1940s. Auckland Libraries Heritage Collections, JTD-04K-05270.

The breadth of Auckland Libraries' Heritage Collections is reflected in the wide-ranging research topics of previous scholars: from Vanessa York's study of botanical perfumery to Dr Majid Daneshagar's work to create a catalogue of the Middle Eastern manuscripts held in Sir George Grey Special Collections to Aleisha Ward's research into the 1920s jazz scene in Auckland.

As well as rare and historic books Auckland Libraries’ Heritage Collections include maps, archives, manuscripts, photographs, drawings, oral histories, musical recordings and ephemera. The formats are both analogue and born digital. Some of these collections are now featured on Kura Heritage Collections Online - the new home for our images, audio, collection records and indexes.

Ref: Auckland Library Heritage Trust scholar, Ross Calman, in the Sir George Grey Special Collections reading room, 2019.

Ross Calman was the Auckland Library Heritage Trust scholar in 2015. He is working on a bilingual edition of Tamihana Te Rauparaha’s 'Life of Te Rauparaha' due to be published later this year. The original manuscript, held in Sir George Grey Special Collections (GNZMMS 27), is an account of the life of Te Rauparaha written in the late 1860s by his son.

Ref: Rykenberg Photography. Howard Morrison Quartet at the Crystal Palace, 1959. Auckland Libraries Heritage Collections, 1269-K152-5.

Gareth Shute and Chris Turnbull were the Auckland Library Heritage Trust scholars in 2018. Part of Shute's research involved creating two online maps of music venues which existed in Auckland in the 1950s and 1960s. The maps include historic images of the venues and information about the venue or one of the musicians connected to the place. Identifying musicians and venues via crowd-sourcing and research was part of Shute's work. The Rykenberg Studios photography collection, ephemera and printed collections were used in his research. 

Chris Turnbull is working on a PhD in Pacific History at the University of Auckland. The Cook Islands leader Queen Makea is the main focus of Turnbull's work. He is interested in the emerging theme of the rise of other women leaders in Polynesia around this time, including Queen Pōmare in Tonga, and Queens Kaʽahumanu and Liliʽuokalani in Hawaiʽi. Turnbull has also found some interesting references to independent ties between the Cook Islands and Māori in the late nineteenth century.

The scholarship is open to New Zealanders and overseas visitors to New Zealand. To apply you need to identify a research proposal based on material held in Auckland Libraries' Heritage Collections. The winner of the scholarship receives a grant of $1000.

Applications for 2019/2020 closed on Friday 31 May 2019.