We welcome submissions from all fields within American studies, especially in the form of monographs for the Lois P. Rudnick Book Prize.

Inquiries may be directed to Renee Romano at rromano@wesleyan.edu.

Congratulations to the 2008 winner of the Rudnick prize, Kevin Rozario.

Kevin Rozario’s engaging and thought-provoking new work, The Culture of Calamity: Disaster and the Making of Modern America (University of Chicago Press, 2007), examines the American response to disasters such as earthquakes, hurricanes, and fires, from colonial times to the present. Americans, Rozario shows, have historically viewed disasters as opportunities for political and economic modernization and growth. Disaster management has also contributed to the growth and the legitimacy of the national security state. Going beyond the American context, Rozario makes a compelling case that disasters have been one of the most important cultural preoccupations of the modern project, and he skillfully reads the cultural productions inspired by disasters such as the San Francisco earthquake, Hurricane Camilla, and the September 11th terrorist attacks to explore the nature of both modernity and postmodernity. From the Puritan belief that disasters were a blessing and God’s instrument for setting man on the path to a better future, to Americans’ contemporary fascination with disasters as spectacle and entertainment, Rozario provides a compelling analysis of the role that calamity has played in the development of the American nation.

Past Winners

2006
James Campbell, Middle Passages: African American Journeys to Africa, 1787-2005 (Penguin Press, 2006)

2005
Bradford D. Martin, The Theater is in the Street (University of Massachusetts Press, 2004)

2003
Peter Gibian, Oliver Wendell Holmes and the Culture of Conversation (Cambridge University Press, 2001)

2001
Nancy Lusignan Schultz, Fire and Roses: The Burning of the Charlestown Convent, 1834 (Free Press, 2000)

1996
Lois P. Rudnick, Utopian Vistas: The Mabel Dodge Luhan House and the American Counterculture (University of New Mexico Press, 1996)

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The Lisa MacFarlane Prize (Undergraduate)

The Lisa MacFarlane Prize will be awarded to the best paper or project written and developed by an undergraduate on any subject related to American Studies. Papers or projects should represent original research, and they should be no more than 30 pages in length. Alternative forms of projects such as documentaries and creative projects should be accompanied by a written piece that demonstrates the research and contribution of the project to the field of American studies. Awards will be announced in time for the fall NEASA Conference, and winning undergraduates will be invited to present their work at the conference. The prize carries a stipend.

Inquiries may be directed to Anthony Antonucci at anthony.antonucci@huskymail.uconn.edu.

Congratulation to Jenny Weissbourd for winning the 2008 Lisa MacFarlane Prize for her essay, "Women's Rights and Women's Health in the Providence Physiological Society, 1850-1851."

Past Winners

2007
Joey Fink (University of Massachusetts-Boston)
"Rights, Reform, and Respectibility:  New England Working Women's Claims to Citizenship in the Nineteenth Century"

Maggie O'Keefe (Yale)
"Reclaiming the Reservation: A Case Study of the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes' Land Management Policies on the Flathead Reservation"