Hidden Narratives at Graceland Cemetery

An Opportunity for Faculty Consultants through Community Project Based Learning

Through a generous grant from the Gaylord and Dorothy Donnelley Foundation, DePaul’s College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences invites all university full time faculty to apply to develop topical, public-facing digital audio tours and/or small museum exhibits for Graceland Cemetery in the context of a project-based learning class for DePaul undergraduates. These courses will be taught during the 2024-2025 and 2025-2026 academic years. Faculty chosen to participate will be awarded a stipend of $9000 for project and course development in either the December Intersession or the Summer prior to their course offering. Faculty may also apply for up to $1000.00 in additional funds to support material costs of their class projects and/or a part-time student worker as a project assistant. Platforms for digital audio tours and museum infrastructure are being provided to Graceland as part of the grant and are not a part of the faculty support awards.

This grant is a part of the Donnelley Foundations Broadening Narratives program designed to use existing collections to tell the stories of overlooked Chicago people and communities. Their website (https://gddf.org/collections/) describes the impetus for the program as follows:

“Collections are comprised of diverse narratives that provide perspectives from the past, contribute to a better-informed present, and lead to a more inclusive, sustainable and healthier future. We encourage collecting organizations … to amplify overlooked voices and animate and expand the stories and insights derived from their collections. Diverse narratives include the stories and perspectives of culturally specific communities—African Americans, Indigenous peoples, and other people of color—LGBTQ perspectives, working-class narratives, small community experiences, as well as other underrepresented groups and viewpoints. Emerging, compelling underrepresented perspectives reflective of collections in the areas of science, public health, and the natural world are also important to our regions’ collective narratives.”

This grant funds DePaul faculty to co-design, with Graceland, a project that:

• Uses the archives of Graceland Cemetery, particularly the documentary archives in Graceland’s collections and/or the headstones and landscapes of Graceland that are their own form of archive.
• Meets the needs of Graceland as a partnering institution and engages the community.
• Results in a public-facing outcome: either a self-guided digital audio tour and/or a museum exhibit that shares previously hidden narratives about Chicago’s past with the broader public.
• Is the focal point of an undergraduate course at DePaul that asks students to work together to contribute substantively to the project’s success and allows them to uncover and share hidden narratives of Chicago’s Graceland Cemetery.

Application Timeline

The application timeline for Hidden Narratives 2024 is outlined below. Interested faculty should feel free to contact the project lead faculty, Jane Baxter, at jbaxter@depaul.edu. Dr. Baxter is available to present to departments or groups of faculty, as well as to consult with individual faculty members interested in participating.

Application Preparation

Applicants for the Hidden Narratives at Graceland Cememtery program should review the Application Guidelines packet, which provides details of all materials that must be submitted through the online application.