Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage Internships and Fellowships

The Smithsonian's Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage archives and records folk music and puts on an annual folk festival on the Washington, DC Mall, showcasing foreign and US cultural heritages. Internships are available year-round for students and non-students. Most are non-paying and length and hours are flexible, ranging from six weeks to a year. Fellowships are also offered through the Smithsonian.

Internship Opportunities:

• Preferred 15-20 hours/week but hours are flexible
• Mentorship Program for a More Diverse Workplace: for women of color (small stipend for 100 hours of work in fall semester)
• Fall 2016 deadline is September 1, 2016 
• Flexible year-round opportunities
• Fields of work:
• Folklife Festival:
• Anthropology, ethnomusicology, language studies focus
• Year-round but particularly in the summer
• Summer: need interns to work on event production, technical crew, Festival marketplace, social media, web production, Festival blog, graphic design, curatorial team, PR, volunteer coordination, video production, administration
• Summer interns must work every day of festival: last week of June and first of July
• Smithsonian Folkways Recording:
• Cross between record label and museum
• Intern projects in marketing, social media, mail order, royalties and copyright, recording production, web production, 
• graphic design, typography internships for students proficient in Adobe Creative Suite with a portfolio to submit
• Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives:
• Work in archives and collections cataloging, preservation, digitization
• Summer interns process audio and video from Folklife Festival
• Welcome Library and Info Studies students 
• Should have interest in world folk traditions, audio engineering, photography, photoshop, web design, or library and archival work 

Application Requirements:

• Online application 
• Essay
• Resume
• Transcript
• Letters of recommendation
• Summer deadline: March 15
• Rest of the year: six weeks before desired start date 

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Fellowship Program:

• Predoctoral, postdoctoral, senior postdoctoral scholars
• Very competitive (according to website)
• Awarded annually
• Arranged through Smithsonian's Office of Fellowships and Grants

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Information about volunteering can be found here.