Our annual end of year fundraising drive allows us to keep the WHA alive and thriving. Your contributions directly benefit members of the community through the Scholarship Fund, contribute to daily operations of the organization through the General Fund, and ensure the future of the organization through the Endowment. Even the smallest gifts can make an impact!
How to Give
Give via PayPal
You can give to the WHA in a number of ways. The simplest and easiest method is through PayPal, and no account is required. Please use the Special instructions box to specify special instructions with your gift (e.g. if you would like your donation allocated to the endowment, or if you would like your donation to be anonymous or made in a different name than that on the credit card).
Give via Venmo
While the WHA does accept Venmo, note that this giving option can only be done via mobile.
Give via The WHA
Give directly through your WHA member account.
Give via Paper Check
The WHA accepts donations via check through the mail. Checks can be made payable to the WHA or World History Association. Our mailing address is:
World History Association
296c Nonotuck St Unit 3A
Florence, MA 01062
What Impact Does Your Donation Have?
When you donate to the WHA, that money is invested back into the community either through operational costs to keep the organization running (when you specify the General Fund), through ensuring the future (when you specify the Endowment), or given directly to members of the community through scholarships and awards. We asked some of our 2024 awardees what impact winning a WHA award, scholarship, or conference funding had on their scholarship and careers. This is what your donation can do:
Oko-Otu Chukwuemeka (University of Buckingham, UK), 2024 World Scholar Travel Grant Awardee
I cannot quantify the impact of the World Scholar Travel Grant. Navigating the PhD journey with partial funding from my university has been such a challenging experience. It was more challenging to combine part-time work with research and thesis writing, conferences and paper writing as a PhD student. However, the World Scholar Travel Grant not only supported my research but also gave me a platform to share and disseminate my research findings. It also gave me good exposure and has added to my profile as a scholar. I visited San- Fransisco for the first time and made good contacts with other scholars. Funds like this encourage scholars to take up the challenging task of research. I will be glad to contribute to this fund in the future to make this go around for other indigent scholars.
Francesca Bray, Barbara Hahn, John Bosco Lourdusamy and Tiago Saraiva, Moving Crops and the Scales of History, 2024 Bentley Book Prize
The World History Association’s award of the Bentley Prize 2024 for our co-authored book Moving Crops and the Scales of History is an enormous honour and privilege. All of us have been inspired by the WHA’s project to promote not only connected histories but connections between historians and historiographies. The Journal of World History has been a regular on our reading lists, and we are thrilled to receive this award named for Jerry Bentley, whose ideas and vision have influenced us all over the years. This generous recognition of our experiment in global history brings it to the attention of exactly the critical readership we hoped to engage with.
As one co-author, Barbara Hahn, puts it: ‘The World History Association and the name Jerry Bentley have sung a siren song to me since graduate school, where courses in the field led me to see beyond narrow national interests to the global processes in which all even local history participates. Recognition from the WHA and the Bentley Prize is one of the sweetest achievements of my career. Thank you and thank my co-authors for getting me there!’
John Bosco Lourdusamy, who attended the San Francisco meeting, emphasises the important role of WHA in expanding the scope, reach and appeal of global history. He writes: ‘The Annual Meetings of the WHA, each in their own specific and incremental ways, have extended the global presence of WHA itself. The choice of challenging and timely themes for each Meeting (like 'Energies' for Pittsburgh 2023; and 'Currents' for San Francisco 2024) make the meetings more appealing and meaningful . However there is tremendous scope for further reach - especially with regard to Asia and Africa. We are sure that with increased and wider support, the WHA would be able to make new progress in those directions.’
With warmest thanks from all of us, Francesca Bray, Barbara Hahn, John Bosco Lourdusamy and Tiago Saraiva.
Mejgan Massoumi, 2024 WHA Dissertation Prize Winner
The WHA Dissertation Prize has been a transformative milestone in my academic journey. Recognizing my dissertation, *The Sounds of Kabul: Radio and the Politics of Popular Culture in Modern Afghanistan, 1960-79,* not only validates the significance of my research but has also catalyzed further scholarly engagement. The acknowledgment by the WHA has been instrumental in advancing my forthcoming book manuscript. It underscores the impact of Afghan radio history on shaping regional dynamics and global diasporic identities.
At the 2024 WHA annual meeting, I had the privilege of connecting with scholars whose work resonates deeply with the global and transnational scope of my research. The conference fostered invaluable intellectual exchanges and critical networking opportunities, enriching my understanding of world history’s diverse methodologies and narratives.
The WHA’s recognition has elevated the visibility of my scholarship in ways that encourage deeper dialogue about sound history, popular culture, and media’s role in shaping modernity. It has reinforced the importance of using cultural history to address broader questions about global and regional transformations. By framing Afghan radio as a medium that connected its audiences to global currents such as Cold War ideologies, decolonization, and transnational pop culture, my work contributes to a broader understanding of modern world history’s spatial and cultural scales.
Trieu Huy Ha, 2024 WHA World Scholar Travel Fund Award Awardee
It is my pleasure to share with you my experiences with the World History Association and the latest meeting of the association at the San Francisco State University last June. The World History Association, a distinguished consortium comprising scholars in the field of world history from around the globe, has accepted me as a member. That is my great honor. As an emerging scholar, this exceptional opportunity facilitated the expansion of my academic network, connecting me with esteemed professors and researchers who share a mutual interest in Southeast Asian history in a general trajectory of world history. As such, I decided to become a newcomer of the association and desired to participate in the 33rd annual meeting of the community.
Fortunately, I was considered and accepted as the 2024 WHA World Scholar Travel Fund awardee at this 2024 association meeting. Before the meeting, the organizers provided three categories of scholarships. I discovered that the WHA World Scholar Travel Fund was perfect for a distant speaker like me. For me, coming from a remote developing country like Vietnam with limited access to international conferences and scholars, this fund is critical in allowing me to come to the United States and engage with peers. The organizer ultimately awarded me this exceptional scholarship after 10 days of expectation. When the organizer notified me, I was overjoyed and grateful to organizers who offered me this tremendous opportunity as a funded conference goer. It is more than just financial assistance; it is appreciation for my hard work, devotion, and potential. It relieved the pressure of travel expenses, allowing me to concentrate exclusively on my presentation rather than worrying about my finances. The WHA World Scholar Travel Fund also provided me with crucial scholarly experiences for my future, including the opportunity to attend potential international conferences and meet with the world history community, which shares my interests in historical studies. It would allow me to fully immerse myself in my history studies, increasing my ability to contribute meaningfully and enhance global history knowledge.
During the conference, I was lucky to attend a session focused on the Vietnam War and world history, where I learned about a bridge between my national history and world history at the 33rd World History Meeting. This is my first time attending a conference as both an association member and a speaker. Many researchers and interested listeners came to share their experiences and opinions with me, allowing us to stimulate lively discussions about this topic and potentially collaborate on book and research initiatives. Joining the conference’s many sessions on world history broadened my horizons for the histories of several geographical regions, including not only Asia (my continent) but also America, Africa, and Europe. Such annual gatherings, in my opinion, play an important role in promoting academic and personal development, as well as strengthening and enlarging our global history community. I really appreciate the organizer's superb help and impeccable coordination throughout the event.
Overall, world history is not merely a collection of dates and events happening around the world; it is the lens through which we can examine the complexities of human behavior, societal development, and cultural evolution, and the World History Association is doing such missions effectively. I believe that the association is expanding research opportunities for historians and professionals coming from developing countries so that our community could expand across the world. I strongly support the association taking proactive steps to ensure the integrity and vitality of world history as a discipline. By connecting historians all around the world, we are not only safeguarding our past but also empowering future generations to learn from it.
Gunja Sengupta and Awam Amkpa, 2024 Bentley Book Prize Awardees
Winning the World History Association’s 2024 Bentley Book Prize for Sojourners, Sultans and Slaves: America and the Indian Ocean in the Age of Abolition and Empire (University of California Press, 2023) has meant the world to us, as scholars and advocates of world history. It has garnered for us, multiple invitations to give book talks in academic as well as public forums, offering us the opportunity to share the true story of how slavery spurred debates over capitalism, human rights, and imperial power rivalries on a global scale during the long nineteenth-century, and shaped the modern world that we have come to inherit. World history is often hard to do, owing to barriers of language, expense, war, and visa regimes. Yet, such history remains an essential component of civic education and mutual understanding in our society. It helps us to appreciate how global connections have bound us down the ages, and continue to mold our collective destinies. The World History Association, by promoting this understanding through its publications and academic awards, plays a vital role in both knowledge creation and public education across national borders.