Joan Kelly Memorial Prize
The 2020 submission deadline has passed. Awardees will be announced this fall.
Established in 1984 and named in memory of Joan Kelly (1928–82), this prize is awarded annually for the book in women’s history and/or feminist theory that best reflects the high intellectual and scholarly ideals exemplified by the life and work of Joan Kelly. The prize was established by the Coordinating Committee on Women in the Historical Profession and the Conference Group on Women’s History (now the Coordinating Council for Women in History), and is administered by the American Historical Association. See the list of past recipients.
The general rules for submission are:
- To be eligible for consideration, submissions shall be books in any chronological period, any geographical location, or in an area of feminist theory that incorporates a historical perspective. Books should demonstrate originality of research, creativity of insight, graceful stylistic presentation, analytical skills, and a recognition of the important role of sex and gender in the historical process. The inter-relationship between women and the historical process should be addressed.
- Books with a copyright of 2020 are eligible for the 2021 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 “Kelly 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, 2021, to be eligible for the 2021 competition. Entries will not be returned. Recipients will be announced on the AHA website in October 2021 and recognized during a ceremony at the January 2022 AHA annual meeting in New Orleans.
For questions, please contact the Prize Administrator.
This year's submission deadline has passed.
The review committee contact information and prize submission form for the next competition will be posted by March 1 for submissions due May 15.
2020 Kelly Prize
Saidiya Hartman, Columbia University
Wayward Lives, Beautiful Experiments: Intimate Histories of Riotous Black Girls, Troublesome Women, and Queer Radicals (W. W. Norton & Co.)
Saidiya Hartman brings the vibrant, beautiful, complicated lives of Black women and girls out of an archive of loss, erasure, and absence. Wayward Lives is unflinching, perceptive, and daring. Hartman is committed to the archives, but her approach overcomes the limits of both archives and of scholarship that viewed Black females as social problems. Wayward Lives shows how Black women’s interior and exterior lives were lived on complex terms. With ambitions and talents, they experimented and created a culture that made “the uninhabitable liveable.”