2nd ANNUAL PUBLIC ANTHROPOLOGY PUBLISHING COMPETITIONS (2009)

DETAILS REGARDING THE COMPETITION, THE SUBMISSION PROCESS, AND THE STANDARDS BY WHICH ENTRIES WILL BE JUDGED

The first competition focuses on professional anthropologists who have already earned a PhD. The winner will be selected based on (1) the public significance of the problem being addressed, (2) the way the problem is being approached, and (3) the author’s ability to write for a public audience (as judged by one or more previous publications). The winner will receive, in addition to a formal book contract from U.C. Press, a ten thousand dollar advance.

Last year, Dr. Catherine Bolten (now of Notre Dame) won in this category with her submission, “I Did It to Save My Life: Morality and Survival in Sierra Leone,” Her book will deal with the moral compromises individuals made during the Sierra Leone civil war and, with the war over, how these individuals now strive to rebuild relationships and integrate back into communities. It is a poetic, penetrating study of human resilience. The first runner-up was Dr. Sarah Horton (University of Colorado at Denver). Sarah’s submission deals with the integration of American and Mexican health care systems at various levels. The second and third runners-up were Dr. Susan Levine (University of Capetown, South Africa) and Dr. Lynne Nakano (The Chinese University of Hong Kong). Susan’s submission weaves together the life stories of working children in South Africa’s wine industry with the general politics of child labor through short, powerful vignettes. Lynne’s focuses on the lives of unmarried women in Shanghai, Hong Kong and Tokyo searching for greater fulfillment.

The second competition focuses on graduate students who are preparing to conduct fieldwork or who have not, as yet, completed their doctoral dissertations and/or received their PhD. The winner will be selected based on (1) the public significance of the problem being addressed, (2) the way the problem is being approached, (3) a sample of the student’s writing, and (4) a signed agreement from the student’s dissertation committee supporting the student writing up his or her research in a form readable by a broad, public audience rather than as a standard academic dissertation.

In the graduate student category, the winner was Claudia Seymour (at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London). Claudia’s proposal explores how children understand and cope with violent conflict using, as a case study, research in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). She hopes, through the publication of her book, to strengthen child protection efforts in areas of violent conflict. Two runner-ups in the graduate student category were: Erin Finley (at Emory University) and Claire Snell-Rood (at the University of Virginia). Erin’s work examines Post-Traumatic Stress Disorders (PTSD) among Mexican-American and Anglo-American veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. Claire’s work considers how women living in the slums of Delhi, India strive to keep their families and themselves healthy.

We would recommend that interested individuals read with care the statement at the link below explaining the basis for evaluating submissions.

We should also highlight a developing relationship with the University of Pennsylvania Press and Rutgers University Press. All entries NOT accepted by the University of California Press’s series in Public Anthropology but of possible interest to Cynthia Mahmood, editor of U Penn’s series on The Ethnography of Political Violence, and to Alex Hinton, editor of Rutgers’ series on Genocide, Political Violence, Human Rights, will be forwarded on to them for consideration in their series. It is our attempt at “one stop” submissions relating to Public Anthropology.

PLEASE CLICK HERE FOR THE SUBMISSION PROCESS AND
DETAILED STANDARDS BY WHICH ENTRIES WILL BE JUDGED

The deadline for submissions is October 1, 2009

Submissions should be emailed to: bookseries@publicanthropology.org with the relevant material enclosed as attachments. Questions regarding the competition should be also directed to Dr. Rob Borofsky at: bookseries@publicanthropology.org.

All entries will be judged by
the Co-Editors of the California Series in Public Anthropology:
Rob Borofsky (Center for a Public Anthropology & Hawaii Pacific University)
and Naomi Schneider (University of California Press)