2025 Victor Turner Prize in Ethnographic Writing Contest Entry
Mar 3 - Jun 15
2025 Victor Turner Prize in Ethnographic Writing
The Society for Humanistic Anthropology (SHA) announces the annual juried competition for the Victor Turner Prize in Ethnographic Writing. The late Victor Turner devoted his career to seeking an accessible language that would reopen anthropology to the human subject, and the competition recognizes the innovative books that further this project. We seek graceful, accessible ethnographic writing which deeply explores its subject and contributes in innovative and engaging ways to the genre(s) of ethnography and the field of humanistic (and/or post-humanistic) anthropology.
Award
A $1,000 first-place, a $500 second place and a $250 third-place prize will be awarded in autumn of 2025 (either via online SHA awards ceremony, or in person at the American Anthropological Association meetings in New Orleans, November 19-23, 2025).
2025 Edie Turner First Book Prize in Ethnographic Writing
Authors for whom their submission to the Victor Turner Prize is also their first book publication will also be eligible for consideration for the Edie Turner First Book Prize in Ethnographic Writing, a newly created award which recognizes Edie Turner’s support and mentorship of junior scholars. Up to two winners of the Edie Turner Prize may be selected at the discretion of the prize committee.
Award
A $1,000 first-place prize, potentially split between co-winners, will be awarded in autumn 2025 (either via online SHA awards ceremony, or in person at the American Anthropological Association meetings in New Orleans, November 19-23, 2025). This award will not affect any book’s consideration for the Victor Turner Prize, and a book may win both awards. There is no separate entry form for the Edie Turner Prize.
Eligibility
- Eligible ethnographic genres for both prizes include single or co-authored book-length monographs, narratives, historical accounts, biographies, memoirs, dramas, and creative ethnography (including nonfiction, fiction, and poetic works); as well as single-authored collections of essays, short prose, or poems (sorry, no edited collections with multiple contributors).
- Only books copywrited in 2024 will be eligible. If the work is in translation to English, we allow 2 extra years from the original publication date; therefore a book published in its original language no earlier than 2022 would be eligible.
- Books must have been peer-reviewed independently of its author(s).
- Books may be entered into the competition by authors, publishers, book editors, or colleagues. No formal letter of nomination is needed.
- Publishers are encouraged to limit their submissions to ten books per publisher.
Submission Guidelines
By June 1, 2025, Please:
- Complete your information in this ENTRY FORM
- Pay the entry fee (details to be provided)
- Submit an electronic copy of your book by the June 1 deadline to moc.liamg@renruTrotciVAHS.
- Short listed book authors will be asked to submit paper copies of their books to each of the judges (addresses will be provided to these authors and/or publishers).
Biographical information submitted will be used for presenting the winners and publicizing the results of the competition and will not be used for judging the quality of the entries.
Submission Fee
For authors who are already or become SHA members, the entry fee is $25/book. For authors who are not SHA members, the entry fee is $75/book. (Publishers: for all books you submit, please check with authors first to discover whether they are current SHA members and please encourage authors to join SHA). The fee may be paid online by June 1 at 11:59pm.