Your Inner Researcher

Bestill my proletarian heart.

This week's web trolling led to a discovery that should thrill failed academics, wannabe-anthropologists and all those who believe that the world's best social research is often conducted by the average joe. 

Awesome Food, a branch of the Awesome Foundation (which has been around since 2009), is now accepting applications for "micro-grants" in all areas of food studies. PhD and residence in the Ivory Tower not required.

Applications are accepted on a rolling basis and the $1,000 grants are doled out about once a month, according to the foundation's website. "We interpret food in its broadest possible way, so use your imagination," it reads, adding that the best ideas are "simple and direct." Past recipients have apparently worked through photo essays, oral narratives, film and the like.

So go! Become my competition. My barbecue-urban-farming-history-of-Cambodian-noodles project will kick your project's tail, anyway.