Blakemore Foundation



The Blakemore Foundation was established in 1990 by Thomas and Frances Blakemore to encourage the advanced study of Asian languages and to improve the understanding of Asian fine arts in the United States.

2012 Language Grant Applications

We are now accepting applications for the 2012 Blakemore Freeman Fellowships and Blakemore Refresher Grants.

Applications for our 2012 grants must be postmarked by December 30, 2011.  Click here to download the application form and grant guidelines.

New this year: Recommendation letters may be sent by email to blakemorefoundation@gmail.com

Questions? Contact Cathy Scheibner by phone at (206) 359-8778 or email.

It’s not just a matter of improvement, but rather more like having blinders lifted. I was a Chinese History Ph.D. student before I received the Blakemore grant and thought I had pretty much reached the level of Chinese I needed for research.
I passively accepted the fact that Chinese was a confoundedly difficult language and there wasn’t much I could do about it. Now I walk down the aisles of books in the East Asian Reading Room and everything seems clear – I look at sources I struggled with a year ago, and the characters melt and give up their meanings. Inscrutable tomes are now full of stories. I no longer sit at a desk under the suspicious gaze of the librarian, pretending I understand what I’m looking at. Now I do understand. I read the papers. I seize random books from the shelves and pore through them. It is wonderful.