For Immediate Release
Press Contact: John F. Stephens
The American Studies Association is proud to recognize the continuing high level of scholarship examining our American cultures. We ask all members of the association to join in congratulating their fellow members to be honored at this year’s award ceremony at our annual meeting in Denver, Colorado. The Awards Ceremony will be held on Friday, November 18, 2016, 7:00pm – 8:00pm, Colorado Convention Center, Level 3 – Capitol Foyer North with champagne and non-alcoholic beverages available to toast and cheer this year’s fantastic award winners! We hope to see you there!
The 2016 Constance M. Rourke Prize
Chair: Laura Briggs, University of Massachusetts, Amherst
Lisa Marie Cacho, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
The Constance Rourke Prize has been awarded annually since 1987 for the best article published in American Quarterly. The winner of this year’s prize is Simeon Man for his article, "Aloha, Vietnam: Race and Empire in Hawai'i's Vietnam War," 67:4 (December 2015): 1085-1108, with finalist mention to Tiara Na'puti and Michael Lujan Bevacqua for "Militarization and Resistance from Guahan: Protecting and Defending Pagat," 67:3 (September 2015).
The 2016 Ralph Henry Gabriel Dissertation Prize
Chair: Kevin Mumford, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
Rebecca Hill, Kennesaw State University
Chandan Reddy, University of Washington
The Ralph Henry Gabriel Dissertation Prize, established in 1974, has been awarded annually since 1987 by the Association for the best dissertation in American studies. The 2016 prizewinner is Cathleen Kiyomi Kozen (University of California, San Diego), “Justice and Its Others: On the Politics of Redress for Japanese Latin Americans."
The 2016 Gene Wise - Warren Susman Prize
Chair: Lisa Kahaleole Hall, Wells College
Jayna Brown, University of California, Riverside
Robert McRuer, George Washington University
The Gene Wise - Warren Susman Prize is awarded each year for the best paper to be presented by a graduate student at the annual meeting. The winning paper may deal with any aspect of American history, literature, or culture, but should reflect the breadth, the critical imagination, the intellectual boldness, and the cross-disciplinary perspective so strongly a part of the scholarship of both Gene Wise and Warren Susman.
The committee is pleased to announce the award for the best graduate student paper submitted for the 2016 meeting will go to Nic John Ramos for "Making a Queer Home for the 'Aberrant': Deinstitutionalization, Skid Row and 'The Dragons.'" Finalist status goes to LeiLani Dowell for "No Way Out: Out in the Night and the 'Unbearable Wrongness of Being,'” Lucia Hulsether for "Capitalism Against Capitalism: The Pedagogy of Solidarity in Transnational 'Peace Tourism,'” and Elspeth Iralu for "Putting Indian Country on the Map: Decolonizing Counter Maps." According to the committee, “this year's pool contained excellent work on a wide array of topics, exhibiting very different kinds of analytical and methodological strengths!"
The 2016 Yasuo Sakakibara Prize
Chair: Ira Dworkin, Texas A&M University
Paul Amar, University of California, Santa Barbara
The Yasuo Sakakibara Prize is awarded annually for the best paper to be presented by an international scholar at the annual meeting. The winning paper may deal with any aspect of American history, culture, or society. The 2016 prizewinner is Chien-Ting Lin (Taiwan) for the paper “Buddha Bless America: Militarized Medical Humanitarianism and Cold War Humanism.” Finalist mention goes to Sylvia C. Frain (New Zealand) for “When Do Colonies Count as ‘America’? Securing and Resisting the ‘homeland’ in Oceania” and Christopher B. Patterson (Hong Kong) for “Heroes of the Open (Third) World: Killing as Pleasure in Ubisoft’s Far Cry Series.”
The 2016 Comparative Ethnic Studies Essay Prize
The Comparative Ethnic Studies Essay Prize is awarded by the Committee on Ethnic Studies for the best paper to be presented at the annual meeting in critical ethnic studies in comparative, transnational, and global contexts. The 2016 prizewinner is Alborz Ghandehari (Koosha) for the paper "Struggle and the Politics of Translation: Translating Intersectionality in Iran.” Finalist mention goes to Evyn Lê Espiritu for the paper "Vexed Solidarity: Vietnamese Israelis and the Question of Palestine."
The 2016 Critical Disability Studies Prize
The Critical Disability Studies Prize is awarded by the Critical Disability Studies Caucus for the best graduate student paper to be presented at the annual meeting in critical disability studies. The 2016 prizewinner is Jessica Cowing, “Obesity and (Un)fit Homes: Health and Belonging in a Settler Nation.”
The 2016 Lora Romero First Book Publication Prize
Chair: Rachel Buff, University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee
David Kazanjian, University of Pennsylvania
Gilberto Rosas, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
The Lora Romero First Book Publication Prize was established in 2002 and is awarded annually for the best-published first book in American studies that highlights the intersections of race with gender, class, sexuality and/or nation. The 2016 winner is Simone Browne, Dark Matters: On the Surveillance of Blackness (Duke University Press). Finalist mention goes to: Keith Feldman, A Shadow over Palestine: The Imperial Life of Race in America (University of Minnesota Press) and Eric Tang, Unsettled: Cambodian Refugees in the New York City Hyperghetto (Temple University Press).
The 2016 John Hope Franklin Publication Prize
Chair: Lynnell L. Thomas, University of Massachusetts, Boston
Randal Maurice Jelks, University of Kansas
Josh Kun, USC Annenberg School
The John Hope Franklin Publication Prize was established in 1986 and has been awarded annually for the best book published in American studies. The 2016 prizewinner is Benjamin Looker, A Nation of Neighborhoods: Imagining Cities, Communities, and Democracy in Postwar America (University of Chicago Press). Finalist mention goes to Lisa Lowe, The Intimacies of Four Continents (Duke University Press).
The 2016 Gloria E. Anzaldua Prize
The ASA’s Committee on Gender and Sexuality Studies awards the Gloria E. Anzaldua Prize to an independent scholar and/or contingent or community college faculty member who demonstrates an affinity with Anzaldua’s oeuvre, vision, or political commitments and who addresses connections among some or all of the following categories: race, ethnicity, citizenship, class, gender, sexuality, and dis/ability. The 2016 prizewinner is Anastazia Schmid, an independent scholar at the Indian Women's Prison. The committee noted “her commitment to foster scholarly life within and beyond the prison and the university classroom, and the quality of her historical work recovering nineteenth century feminist coalitions in underground economies.” Finalist: Anna Balay.
The 2016 Richard A. Yarborough Mentoring Award
The ASA Minority Scholars Committee awards the Richard A. Yarborough Mentoring Award to honor a scholar who, like Richard Yarborough, demonstrates dedication to and excellence in mentoring underrepresented faculty, postdoctoral fellows, and/or college, university or high school students. The 2016 prizewinner is Martin F. Manalansan IV, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. According to the committee, over 40 scholar-activists from institutions around the world enthusiastically nominated Professor Manalansan because of how he “embodies in his everyday practice and his scholarship the intricacies of honest, sophisticated, nuanced, and caring mentorship."
The 2016 Angela Y. Davis Prize
Chair: Rod Ferguson, University of Illinois, Chicago
May C. Fu, University of San Diego
Dylan Rodriguez, University of California, Riverside
The Angela Y. Davis Award for Public Scholarship recognizes scholars who have applied or used their scholarship for the “public good.” This includes work that explicitly aims to educate the lay public, influence policies, or in other ways seeks to address inequalities in imaginative, practical, and applicable forms. The 2016 prizewinner is Steven Salaita, American University of Beirut (Lebanon). "The manifest evidence of Steven's courage and principled refusal to bend in the face of so many forms of repression and intimidation,” the committee noted, “makes him a worthy recipient of this award. We are inspired by his brilliance and fortitude, and his example lights the way for us all."
The 2016 Mary C. Turpie Prize
Chair: Lucy Maddox, Georgetown University
Bruce Burgett, University of Washington, Bothell
Mark Metzler Sawin, Eastern Mennonite University
Annually, the American Studies Association gives the Mary C. Turpie Prize, established in 1993, to a person who has demonstrated outstanding abilities and achievement in American Studies teaching, advising, and program development at the local or regional level. The 2016 prize winner is Robert Rydell, Montana State University. Among his other accomplishments, Professor Rydell has been instrumental in developing an undergraduate major as well as graduate MA and PhD programs in American Studies at his university. "As a committed and energetic teacher, scholar, administrator, and public intellectual whose work has been transformative for his students and his colleagues in the field," the committee concluded, "Robert Rydell demonstrates superbly those qualities that the Turpie Prize was intended to recognize and honor."
The 2016 Carl Bode-Norman Holmes Pearson Prize
Chair: Michael Cowan, University of California, Santa Cruz
Ruth Wilson Gilmore, The Graduate Center of the City University of New York
Janice A. Radway, Northwestern University
The Carl Bode-Norman Holmes Pearson Prize honors lifetime achievement in and contribution to the field of American Studies. Each year’s prize committee is instructed to consider afresh the meaning of a “lifetime contribution to American Studies.” The definitions of terms like “contribution” and even of “American Studies” remain open, healthily contested, and thus renewed. The 2016 prizewinner is George Lipsitz, University of California, Santa Barbara. “Throughout a career characterized by remarkable intellectual creativity and vision, unflinching, passionately-engaged activism, and tireless mentorship of countless, students, colleagues, artists, musicians, and community organizers, George Lipsitz has exerted an unparalleled impact on the character, organization, and future commitments of the field of American Studies.” For these reasons, the committee notes, “George Lipsitz richly deserves the 2016 Carl Bode-Norman Holmes Pearson Prize.”
Community announcements and events are services that are offered by the ASA to support the organizing efforts of critical constituency groups. They do not reflect the decisions or actions of the association’s governance bodies, the National Council or Executive Committee. Questions should be directed to the committee, caucus, or chapter that has authored and posted this notice.