Doctoral Landscape Award: Collaborative Doctoral Award

SGSAH Doctoral Landscape Award (Collaborative Doctoral Award) provides funding for arts and humanities students to conduct interdisciplinary research training.

Key facts

Fee status

All fee statuses

Your country/region

All international

Level

Postgraduate (taught)

Number of awards

1

Value of awards

Deadline

7 November 2025 for prospective supervisors

Scottish Graduate School of Arts and Humanities (SGSAH) Doctoral Landscape Award is funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC).

In 2026, the AHRC will launch the Doctoral Landscape Award, a new funding scheme designed to invest in the arts and humanities and to enable outstanding students to pursue top-quality collaborative, cohort-based, and interdisciplinary research training. It will fund fifty British universities, organized within 7 regional Hubs, to offer fifteen doctoral studentships (3 per annum) between 2026-2030. These highly-competitive and prestigious scholarships provide tuition fees, an annual stipend, access to state-of-the-art training and skills development, research funds, and opportunities to collaborate with peers within and beyond the academy. 

Collaborative Doctoral Award Subjects of Study

The University of Stirling will offer one DLA as a Collaborative Doctoral Award, in which a funded student will undertake a project in partnership with the University and a non-academic partnership. 

Subjects of Study

In order for a proposal to be eligible for consideration by AHRC, the choice of Primary Research Area must come from one of the recognized disciplines listed in the AHRC Funding Guide. The competition is open to the competition is open to supervisors in the following subjects taught within Stirling’s Faculty of Arts and Humanities.

Within the Division of Communications, Media, and Culture

  • Digital Media
  • Film and Media
  • Journalism
  • Public Relations

Within the Division of History, Heritage, and Politics

  • History
  • Heritage
  • Political History

Within the Division of Law and Philosophy

  • Law
  • Philosophy

Within the Division of Literature and Languages

  • Creative Writing
  • Languages (Chinese, French & Francophone Studies, & Spanish & Latin American Studies) and Translation Studies
  • Linguistics
  • Literature
  • Publishing Studies
  • Religion

We also welcome applications for projects that work across, or in some cases, beyond these disciplines. See “Eligibility” for more on interdisciplinary projects.

Value of the Award

  • Full university fees at home rate during the funded period;
  • An annual stipend at the UKRI minimum rate (£20,780 per annum for 2025/26) for the baseline study period of 3.5 years;
  • Access to a DLA Training Programme that is projected to comprise of three components: the Cohort Leadership Programme; Skills Developments Spokes; and Knowledge Exchange Hubs;
  • An additional Individual Training Allowance that can be used to fund individual research and training activities (including internships, placements, international research visits, fieldwork, language learning, residencies) or up to an additional six months of research time.
  • Access to additional funding to cover travel requirements e.g., between partner organisations.

Funding will be adjusted on a pro-rata basis for part-time students.

Eligibility and availability

  • Academic staff based in the Faculty of Arts and Humanities are eligible to apply for this award, in collaboration with a non-academic partner.
  • Recruited students must not yet have started their doctoral study
  • The awarded project may appoint either a home or international student. However, supervisors should be aware that the AHRC studentship only covers home fees In 2026, the University of Stirling will require any international awardee to pay the difference between home and international fees (in 2025, home PhD tuition fees in Arts & Humanities were £5,006 and international PhD tuition fees were £19,500). Funding will not be available from the AHRC beyond the home fee level already covered. For visa purposes, international students will have to demonstrate that they can pay the difference in fees.
  • Supervisors should not appoint students who already hold doctoral qualifications.
  • Interdisciplinary projects are eligible for funding, but 50% of their research must fall within the AHRC’s disciplinary domains.

How to apply

7 November 2025: Application from University of Stirling Supervisor

15 January 2026: Candidate Nomination Form for Attached Candidate

9 March 2026: Candidate Nomination Form for Recruited Candidate

Applications are made in the first instance by University of Stirling supervisors and non-academic partners. Applicants may identify a named candidate in the application [an ‘attached’ candidate] or they may choose to recruit a candidate after their application has been awarded [a ‘recruited’ candidate].

Please consult the scheme application guidance.

We will run a hybrid information session for prospective applicants from 10-12 GMT on Thursday 2 October. For the Teams link, please contact fah-pgr@stir.ac.uk.

In the run up to the application deadline, supervisors and nominated candidates should download and draft their applications on the MS Word (.doc) versions of the forms available:

By 4pm, 7 November 2025 GMT, University of Stirling Supervisors should:

  1. Complete and submit the web application form for CDA Application.

By either 4pm, 15 January 2026 (for attached candidates) or 4pm, 9 March 2026 (for recruited candidates), nominated students should:

  1. Complete and submit the web CDA candidate nomination form.
  2. Arrange for two letters of reference and your academic transcripts to be sent to FAH-PGR@stir.ac.uk Please provide full transcripts – copies of degree certificates alone do not provide sufficient evidence. Transcripts should be in English, and where necessary a certified translation should be provided.