Currently 3 active fellowships open to applicants in Asia, across AI, arts, film, journalism, research, tech and cross-disciplinary practice. Hand-curated and updated weekly. Almost every entry is funded; a few notable unpaid open calls and festival submissions are included as clearly flagged exceptions. Browse the list below, or use the interactive desk for filtering and shortlisting.
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Developh invites applications for its inaugural Tropical Internet Research Fellowship, supporting researchers, writers, and artist-technologists at any career stage who are investigating the cultural and material conditions of the internet across the Philippines and Southeast Asia and are interested in producing written work. The fellowship runs seasonally (every 1-2 years) to support new writing about the 'tropical internet': the online as experienced from the tropical regions of the Philippines and broader Southeast Asia, concerned with heat, extremes, monsoons, distance, islandedness, improvisation, pluralities, and diasporas. It nurtures work examining how the internet is lived, built, resisted, and felt across the region, welcoming research on infrastructures, digital labor, rural-urban internet inequities, algorithmic cultures, online intimacies, and the entangled relationships between land, technology, and the body, and how colonial, corporate, and extractive forces shape infrastructures for connection. WHO SHOULD APPLY: researchers, writers, designers, artists, and technologists with strong ties to the Philippines or broader Southeast Asia; applicants welcome from any present location, with preference to those within the Philippines, particularly outside Metro Manila. Work may relate to an academic thesis, but the produced artifact must be a distinct new work separate from the thesis. COMMITMENTS: produce an output by January 2027 (suggested minimum ~2000 words, in English, Filipino, or any Philippine language); publish with Developh by March-April 2027 with editorial and publication support; present findings by March-April 2027; share citations and research notes for a collective reference library; attend three cohort group meetings; and participate in editorial review and feedback cycles (prototypes and interim essays are encouraged; a fully finished output is not required). FELLOWS RECEIVE: a PHP 20,000 (~USD 300) stipend, with a potential additional stipend depending on fieldwork/research needs; peer learning through online cohort sessions; check-ins with the Developh team and guest critics; editorial and publishing support (coding, design, hosting); and free access to Developh events and workshops for the fellowship period. TIMELINE: application deadline 22 August 2026; writing and research September 2026 to January 2027; publication and presentations March 2027 onwards. Apply via the Google Form. Free to apply.
A research fellowship from Impart, an online platform building accessible resources on South Asia's art histories, in collaboration with Nalli Silks, a heritage textile brand established in 1928. The programme has supported two research projects a year since 2024-25; for the 2027-28 cycle two fellowships are awarded, each carrying a grant of up to INR 5.5 lakhs for one year of independent research and project development. AREAS OF FOCUS: underexplored textile-related histories, practices and traditions across South Asia. Any textile-centric subject may be proposed; the call particularly encourages textiles in religious, literary, liturgical and mythological contexts; the environmental impact of textile production and consumption; endangered or disappearing textile traditions; critical perspectives on textile revivalism, digitisation, archives and material afterlives; labour in textile production with attention to caste, class and gender; relationships between textiles and other cultural forms including storytelling, poetry, music, architecture and material culture; techniques, technologies and tools tied to specific traditions; South Asian textiles within the contemporary global design economy; intellectual property, ownership and cultural rights; and socio-cultural perspectives on the relationship between handmade and industrial textiles. ELIGIBILITY: open to anyone aged 18 or over residing anywhere in the world, provided the project engages with textile practices in the wider South Asia region (Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, the Maldives, Myanmar, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Tibet). Early- and mid-career researchers, designers, archivists, journalists, writers, educators, practitioners, collectives and small organisations are all welcome, and collaborative projects are permitted provided co-creators are credited and listed in the application. Both new and ongoing projects are eligible, but applicants must specify which part of the project the grant will develop and disclose any current or previous funding from other organisations. SUPPORTED FORMATS: journalistic inquiry, documentary film, archive activation, practice-based research, archive generation, digitisation and documentation initiatives, and exhibition or book projects. DELIVERABLES: a comprehensive project report at the end of the grant period; a research dossier developed from that report in collaboration with Impart, presenting key questions and findings and hosted on Impart's website for public benefit; and a set of final project outputs, which may be audio-visual (interviews, short films), visual essays (photographic or process-based documentation), written pieces (essays, features, interviews) or curatorial work (exhibition or digital curation). Fellows also take part in periodic check-ins and submit progress reports. Copyright is settled case by case, but all final outputs must be made openly and freely accessible to the public. APPLICATION: a Google Form structured as a full project proposal, plus a project budget (percentage-based allocation is acceptable, but be as specific as possible), a project timeline for the one-year period with key phases, activities and milestones, and a single supporting PDF containing an up-to-date CV, selected work samples, and up to two letters of support or recommendation. The form is in English; applicants who would prefer another language are invited to write to Impart to arrange an alternative. NOTE: the fellowship has a strict no-tolerance policy on the use of AI or LLMs in the application form or any submitted materials, and any violation results in rejection. KEY DATES: applications close 31 August 2026; awardees notified December 2026; fellowships run January to December 2027. No individual feedback is given on unsuccessful applications.
SAFL, described as South Asia's first research and capacity-building lab for navigating powerful AI, is hiring more than one Research Fellow. Its foundational work is supported by Schmidt Sciences and the Future of Life Institute among others. THE ROLE: original research carried from an open question to a finished result. The lab wants people who can take a question nobody has answered, choose a method that fits it, do the work and write up a result others can check, working closely with the research leads and with room to shape their own agenda and the wider one. RESEARCH AREAS, two broad tracks; you need to be deep in one and able to speak to the others. Managing AI Risks: technical AI governance and policy (the frameworks advanced AI needs and the technical artifacts they depend on, covering evaluation standards, incident reporting, logging and provenance, attribution methods, liability and accountability, and turning technical evidence into standards Indian and international bodies can adopt), and AI security and alignment research (the safety and security of AI systems themselves, including AI and cybersecurity and the security of systems AI is deployed on top of, such as India's digital public infrastructure). Societal and Economic Impacts: the economic impacts of AI on labour, growth and public finances with attention to India and other developing economies, plus psycho-social effects. BAR: at least 3 years of hands-on research experience, described as the lab's most senior research bar, though exceptional people without that experience are encouraged to apply and junior/internship versions exist. HONEST WARNING FROM THE POSTING: 'The work is demanding, and we mean that plainly.' Priorities change as the field changes; output goes to funders, government bodies and outside researchers. Not a role with fixed scope or settled routine. RELATED OPENING: SAFL is also hiring a Scientific Communicator, plus an Organisation Operations Specialist, a Special Projects Fellow and a general expression of interest. DEADLINE: none published; rolling.