Edward Sapir Book Prize
The Edward Sapir Book Prize was established in 2001 and is awarded in alternate years to a book that makes the most significant contribution to our understanding of language in society, or the ways in which language mediates historical or contemporary sociocultural processes. The SLA invites books with conceptual and theoretical focus, as well as ethnographic and descriptive works. Single- or multi-author books – but not edited collections – are eligible. A committee appointed by the president of the SLA evaluates all submissions and choose prize winners. Winners are announced and prizes are awarded in even-numbered years at the SLA Business Meeting during the AAA Annual Meeting.
Nominations for the 2010 Sapir Prize have closed. Books published in 2010 but not nominated for the 2010 award will be eligible for the next round of competition. Guidelines will be announced in 2011.
Past Winners of the Edward Sapir Book Prize
2008
Asif Agha, for Language and Social Relations.
2006
Richard Bauman and Charles Briggs, for Voices of Modernity: Language Ideologies and the Politics of Inequality.
2004
Robert Bringhurst and his posthumous co-authors Ghandl and Skaay, for the three-volume work Masterworks of the Classical Haida Mythtellers.
Honorable mention: Dennis Tedlock, for Rabinal Achi: A Mayan Drama of War and Sacrifice.
2002
Alexandra Jaffe, for Ideologies in Action: Language Politics on Corsica.
Honorable mention: Laura Ahearn, for Invitations to Love: Literacy, Love Letters, and Social Change in Nepal.
Annual Student Essay Prize
The Society for Linguistic Anthropology holds an annual student essay competition at both undergraduate and graduate levels. In order to be eligible for one of these awards, the applicant must have been either a graduate or undergraduate student in a degree-granting program when the paper was written; must be the sole author of the paper; and must submit the paper no more than two years after it was written.
The paper must be an original work based on original research conducted by the author. It will be evaluated on the basis of clarity, significance to the field, and substantive contribution. The paper should be suitable for submission to the Journal of Linguistic Anthropology and must not exceed 25 double-spaced pages, not including bibliography. At the time of submission for this competition, the paper must not have been published or submitted for publication.
Submissions will be evaluated by a panel of judges. A prize will be awarded in each category only if a submission of sufficiently high quality is received. The winner or winners will be announced at the SLA business meeting, which is held during the annual meeting of the American Anthropological Association. The winner in each category (undergraduate and graduate) receives an award certificate as well as a cash prize.
The paper must be submitted electronically in either .pdf or .doc format. It should be sent to Jillian Cavanaugh (SLA Member at Large) at jcavanaugh@brooklyn.cuny.edu by the deadline of June 15. The cover sheet should include the title of the paper; the author’s name; the author’s email address; the author’s college or university affiliation; the prize category (undergraduate or graduate) for which the paper is being submitted; and the name of the faculty member who served as the student’s advisor with respect to the writing of the paper.
Annual Student Essay Prize Winners
2009
Graduate: Benjamin K. Smith (University of Chicago), for “Of Marbles and (Little) Men: Bad Luck, Aymara Boyhood and Masculine Identification.”
Undergraduate: Ruairidh Falconer (University of Aberdeen), for “Santiago Atitlán: Globalisation and Bilingual Development among Youth in a Mayan Town.”
2008
Graduate: Alejandro Paz (University of Chicago), for “The Circulation of Chisme and Rumor: Gossip, Evidentiality, and Authority in the Perspective of Latino Labor Migrants in Israel.”
Undergraduate: Lauren E. Deal (George Washington University), for “Fat Birds and Intercostals: Ideologies of Science and Poetry in Bel Canto Singing.”
2007
Graduate: Isaac Gagné (Yale University), for “Role-Playing and ‘Women’s Language’ in Japan’s Gothic/Lolita Subculture.”
Undergraduate, honorary mention: Lauren Knapp (Grinnell College), for “The Way It Ought to Be: Objectification through Bluegrass Performance.”
2006
No prize awarded.
2005
Graduate: Heather Loyd (University of California, Los Angeles), for “Language Socialization in Nicastro, Italy.”
2004
No prize awarded.
2003
Graduate: Joseph Sung-Yul Park (University of California, Santa Barbara), for “Ideological Aspects of Korean EnglishYumeo.”
2002
Graduate (two prizes awarded):
M. Eleanor Culley (University of Virginia), for “Learning to Listen: Confronting Two Meanings of ‘Language Loss’ in the Contemporary White Mountain Speech Community.”
and
Jonathan Larson (University of Michigan), for “Ambiguous Transparency: Résumé Fetishism in a Slovak Workshop.”
2001
Graduate: Sarah Meacham (University of California, Los Angeles), for “Getting Schooled: Rehabilitative Practices in a Los Angeles Court School.”
Honorable mention, graduate: Angela Reyes (University of Pennsylvania), for “Emergent Paradigms of Asian American Identity.”
