Research Fellow

Research Fellow In Domestic Labor History

Amherst College invites applications for the position of Research Fellow at the Emily Dickinson Museum. The Research Fellow in Domestic Labor History is a fixed-term, 30-hour per week position. The expected salary range for this job opportunity is: $42.74 to $47.01 per hour.

The Research Fellow in Domestic Labor History will conduct original primary-source research to provide evidence for the Museum to document and interpret the domestic conditions that afforded Emily Dickinson the opportunity to compose a large body of poetic and epistolary work.

Working with archival, manuscript, and material culture collections, the Fellow will examine records including correspondence, financial documents, census data, maps, employment records, newspapers, church records, artifacts, landscapes, the built environment, and other contemporaneous sources to identify and reconstruct the lives and labor of individual domestic workers associated with Dickinson family households and comparable homes in the region.

The Fellow will investigate and analyze the social, economic, and cultural structures of nineteenth-century Amherst and New England—including systems of race, gender, class, ethnicity, immigration, and labor—that shaped the experiences, opportunities, and constraints of domestic workers. This work will situate individual biographies within broader regional contexts of domestic service, wage labor, household economies, and shifting social hierarchies. The Fellow will assess how visible and invisible labor within the home—including cooking, cleaning, laundry, caregiving, agricultural labor, animal husbandry, and other forms of household and homestead management—contributed to sustaining social, psychic, and material environments in which employers could pursue intellectual, professional, civic, and creative endeavors.

The position requires critical attention to gaps and silences in the historical record and interpretive possibilities for representing individuals whose lives were often minimally documented. The Fellow will produce well-documented research findings and will work with the Senior Director of Programs to develop an interpretive framework from these findings. The Museum may incorporate research results into the visitor experience through interpretation, public programs, exhibitions, publications, and institutional scholarship, thereby advancing a fuller and more inclusive account of the historical conditions that supported Dickinson's authorship.

This position advances the institution's commitment to inclusive, evidence-based scholarship and to expanding historical interpretation to more fully represent the lives and labor of individuals whose contributions have been understudied or marginalized in the historical record.

Summary of Responsibilities:

Research & Documentation

• Conduct rigorous primary-source research in local, regional, and national archives, including census records, employment records, correspondence, legal documents, newspapers, account books, church records, and genealogical sources.
• Prepare annotated bibliographies and source documentation for institutional archives.

Scholarly Writing & Dissemination

• Identify and reconstruct biographical narratives of individual domestic workers associated with relevant households.
• Produce written analytical research reports and interpretive briefs suitable for internal use, interpretive planning, digital content, and/or public programs.
• Present research results to staff and constituents and to the annual meeting of the Emily Dickinson International Society in July 2027.

Collaboration & Institutional Engagement

• Collaborate with an advisory committee of subject matter experts to determine research directions and work plans, identify resources, and assess progress.
• Periodically present findings to the advisory committee.
• Assist the Senior Director of Programs, Education Programs Manager, and Collections Manager in employing research results to develop museum materials and public programming.

Qualifications:

Required

• M.A. in History, American Studies, African American Studies, Women's & Gender Studies, Labor History, Public History, or a closely related field.
• 1 to 3 years of related experience.
• An equivalent combination of education/experience in lieu of the minimum education and related experience.
• Demonstrated experience conducting primary-source archival research.
• Demonstrated ability to analyze and interpret archival evidence to interpret how systems of race, gender, class, and ethnicity operated in specific historical settings.
• Excellent scholarly writing and communication skills.
• Ability to work both independently and collaboratively in a museum or public history setting.
• Ability to travel to access primary source material.
• Successful completion of required reference and background checks.
• An acceptable criminal offender records information (CORI) check.

Preferred

• Ph.D. in History, American Studies, African American Studies, Women's & Gender Studies, Labor History, Public History, or a closely related field.
• Research specialization in 19th-century American social or labor history.
• Experience with genealogical research methodologies.
• Familiarity with material culture and household studies.
• Experience translating scholarly research for public audiences.