We are thrilled to report that the Freedom Together Foundation has just approved a two-year $200,000 grant to the Center for Engaged Scholarship.
As part of the grant, we have created a Democratic Resilience Fellowship to fund research in support of strengthened democratic institutions. For the 2025-2026 academic year, this position will be held by Orlando Lara, an anthropology student at the University of California, Irvine.
Orlando’s research focuses on precarious citizenship in the Rio Grande Valley and Southeast Texas where government authorities have challenged the validity of birth certificates, especially those signed by midwives. This represents a backdoor mechanism to deny birthright citizenship with obvious consequences for the ability of individuals to participate in democratic governance. Orlando combines ethnographic and archival research to document this precarity.
The funds from Freedom Together will also support our small grant program that funds CES fellows to engage in collaborative projects with grassroots groups. Our aim is to accelerate the back-and-forth flow of ideas between engaged academics and activists working for social, racial, gender, and environmental justice. We see this as a critical pathway for strengthening democratic self-governance.