Fonds BJP Fellowship

NIAS offers the fellowship in cooperation with the Fonds Bijzondere Journalistieke Projecten (Fonds BJP). It allows journalists to devote themselves full-time to a substantial project that will result in one or more Dutch-language publications. The project may be a non-fiction book, a series of articles, a podcast, a documentary or a multimedia production.

At NIAS, journalists join a community of scholars, writers and artists from the humanities, the social sciences and beyond. Former fellows have found that exchange with scholars from other disciplines enriches their work. Their methods and ways of telling a story in turn open new avenues for the research of other fellows.

The fellowship is open to Dutch-speaking journalists, freelance or employed, who have already made significant progress on a journalistic project. Investigative series, long-form journalism, podcasts, documentaries, visual journalism and other formats are all eligible, provided the project is journalistic in nature and meets the criteria set by Fonds BJP.

The working language at NIAS is English, and applicants should speak and write it well enough to take a full part in the weekly seminars and the life of the institute. The project itself must result in a Dutch-language publication.

Former NIAS fellows may apply again only if at least ten years have passed since their previous fellowship.

The fellowship is offered every other year, for the second semester of one academic year and the first semester of the next. The fellow receives a stipend of €3,500 per month. NIAS provides an office in the centre of Amsterdam, access to its library services, and a full academic and social programme, including weekly seminars and communal lunches on weekdays. Fellows whose one-way travel time exceeds 90 minutes may be eligible for subsidised accommodation in Amsterdam.

A fellowship at NIAS is a full-time commitment. Fellows are expected to be at the institute four days a week from the start to the end of their semester. More information is available under What NIAS offers and Commitment, rules and regulations.

Applications are submitted in Dutch to the Fonds BJP. The Fonds assesses all applications and nominates a candidate to NIAS. The NIAS Director makes the final decision on the advice of the Fellowship Advisory Committee.

The Fonds BJP was set up in 1990 by a group of journalists. It funds journalistic projects of many kinds, including articles, podcasts, documentaries, photography and non-fiction books, and receives support from the Dutch Ministry of Education, Culture and Science. Journalists it has supported include Judith Koelemeijer, Geert Mak, Jeroen Smit and Annejet van der Zijl, and many of the projects it has funded have won journalism prizes.

The fellowship began as the Journalist-in-Residence programme. It was initiated by NIAS Rector Henk Wesseling and Ben Knapen, then director of PCM, to give journalists from de Volkskrant and NRC the opportunity to write a book in an academic setting without interruption. The first fellow arrived in 2002. The fellowship is now open to a much wider range of journalists and projects.

1. Romy van Baarsen (2025/26), researcher and journalist, worked at NIAS on her book Human and Border, about the normalisation of violence at Europe’s external borders. She describes her research and her time at NIAS in a series of columns, Tussen de regels, part one, Tussen de regels, part two (in Dutch).

1. Sanne de Boer (2023/24) reflects on her time at NIAS where she worked on a book about the Italian mafia organisation ‘Ndrangheta, the follow-up to her debut Mafiopoli (in Dutch).
2. Kasper van Laarhoven (2023/24) describes how he experienced his time at NIAS while working on his book about the Cornelius Haga Lyceum (in Dutch).
3. Lynn Berger (2021/22), journalist for De Correspondent, about writing in a room of one’s own (in English).
4. Saar Slegers (2020/21), radio journalist and podcast maker, talks about her fellowship in an audio interview (in Dutch).
5. Marijn Kruk (2019/20), writing for De Groene Amsterdammer, on his corona-ridden fellowship (in English).
6. Sarah Venema (2018/19), freelance journalist writing for De Volkskrant and De Groene Amsterdammer, reports about what happens when you enter NIAS (in English).