James A. Rawley Prize
The submission deadline has passed. Awardees are announced in the fall, and the next contest will begin in spring 2023.
The James A. Rawley Prize in Atlantic History was created in 1998 in accordance with the terms of a gift from James A. Rawley, Carl Adolph Happold Professor of History Emeritus at the University of Nebraska at Lincoln. It is offered annually to recognize outstanding historical writing that explores aspects of integration of Atlantic worlds before the 20th century.
The current prize amount is $1,000. See the list of past recipients.
The general rules for submission are:
- Only books of a high scholarly and literary merit will be considered. Research accuracy and originality are also important factors in the evaluation of the books.
- Books with a copyright of 2022 are eligible for the 2023 award.
- Nomination submissions may be made by an author or by a publisher. Publishers may submit as many entries as they wish. Authors or publishers may submit the same book for multiple AHA prizes.
- Nominators must complete an online prize submission form for each book submitted.
- One copy of each entry must be sent to each committee member and clearly labeled “Rawley Prize Entry.” Print copies preferred unless otherwise indicated. If only e-copy is available, please contact review committee members beforehand to arrange submission format.
Please Note: Entries must be received by May 15, 2023, to be eligible for the 2023 competition. Entries will not be returned. Recipients will be announced on the AHA website in October 2023 and recognized during a ceremony at the January 2024 AHA annual meeting in San Francisco.
For questions, please contact the Prize Administrator.
2021 Rawley Prize
Allison Margaret Bigelow, University of Virginia (Monacan land)
Mining Language: Racial Thinking, Indigenous Knowledge, and Colonial Metallurgy in the Early Modern Iberian World (Omohundro Inst. of Early American History and Culture and the Univ. of North Carolina Press)
This innovative study of the technical and scientific vocabularies that miners developed in the Americas features the four main metals—gold, iron, copper, and silver—of imperial endeavors. Ranging across the Americas during the 16th and 17th centuries, Mining Language deftly demonstrates that colonial mining methods had Indigenous and African roots. Primarily a literary scholar, Allison Margaret Bigelow is fully committed to interdisciplinary work. Her pioneering linguistic and visual analyses uncover a world of incorporation and erasure.