Since 1981, the Charlotte W. Newcombe Doctoral Dissertation Fellowship has recognized outstanding doctoral work in the areas of religion and ethics. Administered by the Woodrow Wilson Foundation, the award, which carries a $25,000 stipend, is for full-time dissertation writing for PhD candidates at American universities in the US. This year, as in years past, we are recognizing the award recipients, including four AHA Members: Samuel Anderson (UCLA), Hannah Barker (Columbia Univ.), Zain Lakhani (Univ. of Pennsylvania) and Caroline Spence (Harvard Univ.). Congratulations to recipients, and good luck in the final year of writing your dissertation.

The 2013 Charlotte W. Newcombe Doctoral Dissertation Fellows*

Samuel Anderson, University of California, Los Angeles, World Arts and Cultures/Dance
Celebrity, Violence, and the Mystic Arts in Postwar Sierra Leone

Hannah Barker, Columbia University, History
Egyptian and Italian Merchants in the Black Sea Slave Trade, 1260-1500

Christine Bourgeois, Princeton University, French and Italian
Saintly Asceticism and the Literary Machine: The Many Lives of Saint Anthony the Great

Anthony Byrd, Emory University, Religion
As a Benefit for Mankind: Qādī ‘Abd al-Jabbār’s (d. 1025) Free Will Theodicy

Lang Chen, Yale University, Religious Studies
Elixir or Poison? Indian Origins and Chinese Interpretations of Buddhist Antinomian Narratives

Molly Farneth, Princeton University, Religion
Agon and Reconciliation: Ethical Conflict and Religious Practice in Hegel’s Account of Spirit

Meredith Gamer, Yale University, History of Art
Criminal and Martyr: Art and Religion in Britain’s Early Modern Eighteenth Century

Philippa Hetherington, Harvard University, History
Victims of the Social Temperament: Prostitution and the Campaign against the Traffic in Women in Imperial Russia and the Soviet Union, 1880-1935

Zain Lakhani, University of Pennsylvania, History
Bodily Harms: Rape and the Political Meaning of Violence in the Age of Human Rights

Roi Livne, University of California, Berkeley, Sociology
Debitum Naturae? The Moral Economies of U.S. End-of-Life Care

Elham Mireshghi, University of California, Irvine, Anthropology
Business with God or Kidneys for Cash: An Ethnography of Moral Uncertainty in Iran

Yasmin Moll, New York University, Anthropology
Producing Islam: Religion, Media and Visuality in Contemporary Egypt

Micah Morton, University of Wisconsin, Anthropology
From Blood to Fruit: Akha Ancestral Burdens and the Pursuit of a Modern Authenticity in Mainland Southeast Asia and Southwest China

Maria Quintana, University of Washington, History
Be Our Guest (Worker): Making Meaning out of Race, Labor and Empire during the U.S. Emergency Labor Programs, 1942-1964

Ayelet Rosen, New York University, Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies
Ottomanizing a Balkan Province: The Consolidation of Ottoman Power in Bosnia, 1463-1580

Anna Rosensweig, University of Minnesota, French and Italian
Tragedy and the Ethics of Resistance Rights in Early Modern French Theater

Allison Youatt Schnable, Princeton University, Sociology
Voluntary Entrepreneurs: The Growth of Grassroots American Development Organizations

Nathaniel Sharadin, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, Philosophy
Understanding Reasons

Caroline Spence, Harvard University, History
Beyond the Black Legend: Spanish Laws and Slavery in the British Empire, 1783-1840

Natalia Suit, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, Anthropology
Qur’anic Matters: Mushaf as Object in Cairo

Andrew Ventimiglia, University of California, Davis, Cultural Studies
Spirited Properties and Religious Possessions: Intellectual Property Rights in the American Spiritual Marketplace

Winter Werner, Northwestern University, English
The Gospel and the Globe: Missionary Enterprises and the Cosmopolitan Imagination, 1795-1910

* Dissertation titles are subject to change. The titles reflected here were correct at the time the awards were made.

This post first appeared on AHA Today.