The GRF aims to supplement the eight UGC-funded universities’ own research support to researchers who have achieved or have the potential to achieve research excellence, while the ECS is intended to nurture junior academics and to prepare them for a career in education and research.

This year, the Faculty is delighted to learn that our young researchers performed particularly well in ECS and wishes them every success in their endeavours to drive innovation in arts and humanities research to contribute to the betterment of society.

Among the awarded projects in the Faculty this year, Assistant Professor Christina Cheung‘s project, which is also her first application, “Motherhood in Turbulent Times – Reconstructing Breastfeeding and Weaning Practices in Medieval and Early Modern Italy using Stable Isotope Analysis”, from the Department of Anthropology, is granted $1.15 million. Prof. Cheung’s project aims to examine the changes in breastfeeding/ weaning practices though times of intense social instability using biochemical methods. Using archaeological populations form Northern Italy as case studies, this study seeks to examine how the notion and practice of “motherhood” has changed in response to larger societal changes, such as invasions, pandemics, and urbanisation.

The Faculty pledges to facilitate the development of individual and collaborative research projects as well as programmes in order to extend their broad impact beyond academia.