Modern Heritage Research Grants
Monetary support is available for research proposals to conduct independent investigative work for a period of 6 months.
Grants can be awarded to individuals or teams from different entities or institutions. Teams may include academics from various institutions, professional organizations, or be formed as a group of individuals.
Proposed Theme for Cycle 2 Edition
Modern Heritage as Living Practice: Adaptation, Memory, Contribution, and Futures-
Modern heritage is increasingly recognized as a dynamic and evolving field of knowledge, reflecting the ways buildings, landscapes, and communities adapt, endure, and acquire new meanings over time. This theme invites projects that move beyond preservation as a static act of safeguarding the past, encouraging critical inquiry into modern heritage as a living resource shaped by environmental adaptation, everyday practices, underrepresented narratives, and emerging futures. It positions the UAE's modern heritage as a valuable source of climate knowledge, collective memory, cultural innovation, and design intelligence that can inform contemporary approaches to documentation, conservation, adaptive reuse, and sustainable development. By fostering interdisciplinary research and creative practice, the theme seeks to generate new perspectives and actionable insights that strengthen the relevance of modern heritage in addressing present and future challenges. Applicants are invited to develop research proposals within one of the focus areas outlined under this theme.
Focus areas
1. Climate Intelligence:
- Focuses on passive cooling, shade, ventilation, orientation, courtyards, thresholds, Material experimentation in hot and arid environments. How traditional environmental knowledge informed modern construction, and Lessons from modern heritage for future climate-responsive design
2. Everyday Modernities:
- Explores housing, schools, civic buildings, markets, oral histories, social histories, and lived experiences connected to modern buildings, and the ways modern architecture shaped daily life and collective memory in the UAE.
3. Modern Contributions and Regional Networks:
- Highlights the people, communities, and networks behind modern heritage, including Emirati architects, planners, women’s contributions, GCC connections, industrial heritage, and community-generated archives.
4. Future Conservation and Digital Practice
- Looks at adaptive reuse, digital documentation, AI, heritage visualization, conservation techniques, and how modern heritage can inform future cities and cultural development.
Program Components/incentives:
- 1-1 support sessions with grantees through their research period
- Administration and Meet & Greet Sessions
- Midway Presentations with prestigious regional and international expert guests
- Expert Mentorship and guidance by the Modern Heritage Technical Committee (MOC)
- Letters of Support from the Ministry of Culture
- Access to Zayed University Libraries and databases (physical and digital)
- Fully covered Final Exhibition of projects
- Annual Modern Heritage Symposium
Eligibility Criteria
- Open to researchers, practitioners, and academics, who are interested in the modern architecture heritage of the UAE.
- Proposals must address the built environment of the UAE from mid to the end of the 20th century. Current and/or future impacts and influences of the period can also be considered.
- Submissions can be made by individuals or collectives and are open to residents and non-residents of the UAE. However, lead grant holders must be UAE residents. If you are a non-resident of the UAE, you can be part of a collective submission.
- The individual and collective grant amount should not exceed 50,000 AED per proposal submission.
- The project must be completed within six months, and a detailed timeline should be included in the application form.
- Project proposals that are related to or building on a master’s dissertation can be considered.
- All proposals (including creative works) must be built on validated primary research and must be original.
- Ongoing work shall not have previously been funded by another grant for the same project or the grant proposal must add a new aspect to the ongoing work.
- Ongoing scholarly research leading to the publishing of an article, book chapter, or book, can be supported if the final work will be completed at the end of the 6-month grant period.
Selection Process
01
Applications will undergo a two-stage review and selection process by an internal committee and an advisory committee composed of specialists in the field of modern heritage.
02
Only shortlisted applications in the first stage will be contacted, and interviews may be held to support the second stage of the selection process.
Selection Criteria
01
Proposals will be reviewed based on eligibility, program requirements, impact, innovation, originality, and overall quality of an application.
02
Any applications that do not fulfill the criteria mentioned above or are incomplete will be excluded.