The Einar and Eva Haugen Memorial Scholarship

Scholarship Background

Einar Ingvald Haugen, popularly and aptly known as the Dean of Norwegian-American studies, was born April 19, 1906, in Sioux City, Iowa. He died in Belmont, Massachusetts, June 20, 1994. Einar's parents, John and Kristine Haugen, emigrated from Oppdal, South Trøndelag, Norway, in 1899. John was a carpenter and Kristine, who rose to prominence as a cultural figure in the Norwegian-American community, left Norway as a certified teacher. Einar was their only child. Einar attended Morningside College in his home town, Sioux City, Iowa, for three years. Wishing to study under the author of Giants in the Earth, Ole Edvart Rølvaag, he transferred to St. Olaf College for his senior year, receiving his B.A. degree from that college in 1928. Shortly after earning his Ph.D. degree at the University of Illinois in 1931, he began his distinguished career at the University of Wisconsin, where for thirty-three years he built an ever stronger Scandinavian studies department. He soon led the field in giving a scholarly dimension to the Norwegian-American immigrant experience in America. Working on a broad front, he produced a veritable one-man library that included biographies, history, literature, translations, Norwegian language texts, readers, glossaries, and a much needed Norwegian-English dictionary that incorporated both of Norway's national languages. He became the Torger Thompson Professor of Scandinavian Languages and Linguistics in 1938, and Vilas Research Professor in 1962. A self-made linguist, Haugen not only lived out his life on the cutting edge of that discipline but expanded its boundaries. Of special significance was his two-volume study The Norwegian Language in America: A Study in Bilingual Behavior, an examination of the social and linguistic forces at work when an immigrant language, in this case Norwegian, functioned alongside American English, the language of the dominant culture. This and other landmark linguistic studies won Haugen international recognition and acclaim. He was appointed to the Victor S. Thomas Chair in Scandinavian and Linguistics at Harvard University in 1964. He retired from teaching in 1975 but remained productive until his death in 1994.

Eva Lund Haugen was born in Kongsvinger, Norway, February 4, 1907. She died October 25, 1996, in Fort Wayne, Indiana, where she had for a brief time lived with her daughter Anne Littlefield and family. Eva Lund Haugen was twelve years old when her journalist parents, Lully and Einar Lund, emigrated in 1919. They settled first in Fargo, North Dakota, but moved in 1927 to live permanently in Decorah, Iowa, where both parents worked for the respected Norwegian-American newspaper, Decorah-Posten. Einar Lund became one of that paper's abiding editors and Lully its consummate and lively proofreader. Eva was working at the Luther College library when Einar Haugen, her future husband, dropped in to do some research. Eva attended the University of Illinois in 1930-1931. They married in 1932 and made their home in Madison, Wisconsin. Eva continued her studies at Wisconsin and received her B.A. degree in 1935. Their first child, Anne, was born in 1937, and Camilla in 1940. When Einar began to teach at Harvard they bought a home in nearby Belmont. A group calling itself the Scandinavian Forum met there once a month. Eva, devoted to her cultural heritage, became her husband's working partner in many of the projects he undertook, certainly those that involved complicated patterns of compiling, sorting and editing, as was true for the Norwegian-English Dictionary. She proofread most of the publications her husband prepared for publication. With her husband she was co-editor and translator of Land of the Free: Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson's America Letters 1880-1881. She compiled A Bibliography of Scandinavian Dictionaries, Kraus International, White Plains, New York, 1984, 387 pages. Einar wrote the foreword.
The many who have had the good fortune to know the Haugens will remember them not only as productive scholars but also as gracious hosts and loyal friends, persons who identified easily with people from all walks of life. Eva will be remembered for her wit and good humor, her precise speech and regal bearing. May the scholarship that bears their name advance the vision they held and the causes they pursued down through time.

Scholarship Awards Committee

Section A
The Editor of the NAHA publications shall serve as the permanent chair of the Awards Committee. The chair shall receive the scholarship applications, convene the committee and preside over the deliberations. When unable to serve, the chair shall name his or her own deputy who must be an officer or a member of the NAHA. The NAHA secretary's office shall provide the committee with clerical assistance.

Section B
The Awards Committee shall consist of four members. In addition to the chairman three persons shall be selected in the following manner: One appointed by the president of the Society for the Advancement of Scandinavian Study; one by the chair of a university department offering graduate work in Scandinavian studies; and, when appointed, the two members cited above shall together with the chair name a fourth. Save for the chair, committee members shall serve a non-renewable three-year term. The initial committee shall be authorized to create a staggered arrangement for appointments should it wish to do so.

Section C
Because the NAHA rules out the use of scholarship funds for committee travel costs, geographic convenience shall be considered when appointments are made. If the committee, however, agrees that one of its members can serve as a reader who may submit his or her recommendations by mail or telephone, then this directive applies only to two appointments.

Section D
The Awards Committee is responsible to the Executive Board of the NAHA. Award decisions made by the committee require Board approval. The Awards Committee may at any time forward to the Executive Board recommendations that call for revision of its own committee structure, mode of operation, and the character and amount of the awards, should circumstance and experience justify change.

Section E
The Awards Committee shall be self-perpetuating in that the committee shall notify the appropriate stations when new appointments must be made. In the event of appointment neglect or delay, committee members shall serve until a replacement has been named.

Section F
The Awards Committee shall have the additional duty of seeking ways and means to assure continued growth of the Haugen Fund. This assignment does not rule out the creation by the committee of ad hoc or sub-committees to supplement the efforts of the Awards Committee.

The Awards

Section A
One or more grants of not less than $3,000 having the title, "The Einar and Eva Lund Haugen Dissertation Scholarship," shall be awarded annually in the month of April to outstanding graduate students who have completed their course work and other preliminary requirements for a Doctoral degree.

The dissertation shall treat a Scandinavian or Scandinavian-American topic. Otherwise, the award is open to a wide range of academic disciplines in the arts, humanities and social sciences.
Barring future policy change, the scholarship is not renewable.

Awards shall be based on an evaluation of the applicant's academic record, three references, the thesis proposal and the applicant's work plan and future professional goals.
Awards shall normally be made to applicants who have completed their pre-dissertation requirements within the preceding year.

Direct applications (no forms are needed) together with the above described documents by March 1 to:

Chairman, Haugen Scholarship Committee
c/o Norwegian-American Historical Association
1510 St. Olaf Avenue
Northfield MN 55057-1097.

Section B
The Awards Committee shall exact high standards when "Dissertation Scholarships" are awarded. The mere presence of a candidate with a thesis topic related to Scandinavian study shall not obligate the committee to make an award. In the absence of applicants or in the absence of an outstanding candidate, the Awards Committee shall choose one of the following options:
1. Hold the available award money in escrow for distribution in future years.
2. Add the available award money to the principal.