Creative Ethnographic Prose Competition

Every year, the Society for Humanistic Anthropology holds a writing contest for creative ethnographic prose writing. The Creative Ethnographic Prose Competition (formerly the Ethnographic Fiction and Creative Nonfiction Competition) celebrates the capacity of story to engage readers and explore anthropological concerns.

Whether fiction or nonfiction in content, narrative or non-narrative in structure, these creative prose pieces reflect insights about the real world seen through an anthropological lens or reflecting an anthropological sensibility. Successful works generally have concrete vivid details, a clear focus, and a consistent authorial voice.

Eligible works are a maximum of 20 pages (approx. 5,000 words), and eligible authors are affiliated with the field(s) or practice of anthropology and/or ethnography in some manner.

Refer to the summer issues of Anthropology and Humanism for examples of some of our excellent previous winning pieces.

Deadline for submission to this contest is typically in late spring / early summer.

Please return for the Call for Submissions.

The prize includes a free SHA membership.

©DKavadias, Messinia, Greece, 2014

Past Winners

 

  • 1st Prize, Nicolás Díaz Letelier, Where War Dwells

    Honorable Mention, Sonakshi Srivastava, We Did Not See Anything

    Honorable Mention, Hannah Wadle, Dismantling the Ark

  • 1st Prize, Margaret Buchac, Don't Stick Your Head Above the Wheat Field

    Honorable Mention, Cory-Alice Andre-Johnson, Hunger

    Honorable Mention, Azaria Brown, in the days that follow

  • 1st Prize, Amrapali Maitra, The Most Beloved Cow in Gokulpur

    2nd Prize, Aaron Hames, Forgetting

    3rd Prize, Petra Rethmann, The Election

  • 1st Prize, Lisa Arensen, Province of Thieves

    2nd Prize, Erika Robb Larkins, Working for Nico

    3rd Prize, Laura Meek, Azizi

    3rd Prize, Page McClean, Crossing a River Without a Horse

    Honorable Mention, Nina Toft Djanegara, Illegible

    Honorable Mention, Susan Wardell, Walking memories

  • 1st Prize, Kyrstin Mallon Andrews, Ay Vieja

    2nd Prize, Olivia Guntarik, Michael Jackson in Borneo

    3rd Prize, Maureen Pritchard, Whatever Happened to Shaman Sasha?

  • 1st Prize, Miriam Jerotich Kilimo, Rebirth

    2nd Prize, Sowparnika Balaswaminathan, The Outsiders

    3rd Prize, Laura S. Grillo, The Boiling Cauldron

    Honorable Mention, Gemma Louise Williams, We're All Strangers Here

    Honorable Mention, Steven Gonzalez, Silicon Fox

    Honorable Mention, Taylor Hazan, Ethnography of a Stone

  • 1st Prize, Annalisa Bolin, A Ghost Map of Kigali

    2nd Prize, Helle Bundgaard, Much Ado about a Ladies Bicycle

    Honorable Mention, Jesse Cheng, Why This Killer Should Live

    Honorable Mention, Xenia Cherkaev, St. Xenia and the Gleaners of Leningrad

    Honorable Mention, Rima Praspaliauskiene, Lenin

  • 1st Prize, Elisabeth Yarbakhsh, Call

    2nd Prize, Caitrin Lynch, A Portrait of Judy Garrity

    3rd Prize, Brynn Champney, On a Hill With No Name

    Honorable Mention, Kristen Ghodsee, Market Economics

  • 1st Prize, Katrina Daly Thompson, Secrets of a Swahili Marriage

    2nd Prize, Alexandra Vieux Frankel, Waiting for Firat

    3rd Prize, Xenia A. Cherkaev, How grades had been gotten for Penguins and Money

  • Winner, Hunter Liguore, Court of Last Resort

    Honorable Mention, Dannah Dennis, Fifty-Three Kilos

  • Winner, Caitlin Baird, Rain

    Honorable Mention, Kesia Alexandra, The Street Will Never Love You Like I Do

  • Winner, Kim Huynh, The Professional

    Honorable Mention, Glenn Harvey Shepard, The Eye of the Needle

  • Winner, Thararat Chareonsonthichai, The Fragrance of the Classical Past

    Honorable Mention, Cynthia Keppley Mahmood, How Jesse Became a Revolutionary

  • Winner, Kristen Ghodsee, Tito Trivia

  • Winner, John Colman Wood, Life Damages You

  • Co-Winner, John Colman Wood, Cold Patience

    Co-Winner, Laura Biagi, The Cure

  • Co-Winner, Michael Agrosino, The Shrine

    Co-Winner, Don Mitchell, Have You Seen Wanawo?

    Honorable Mention, Jessica Falcone, Choli Ke Peeche

  • Winner, Roxanne Varzi, Mashti

  • Co-Winner, Michelle Bellino, All the Nice Restaurants

    Co-Winner, Sally Bellerose, Frenchie's Girls

  • Winner, Marisabel Almer, Han Transcurrido Los Años…

    Honorable Mention, Tamar Diana Wilson, La Presidente

  • Co-Winner, Rachel Newcomb, Gifts

    Co-Winner, Tiffany Hamburger, On the Origin of Extinction

    Honorable Mention, James Canon, The Day the Men Disappeared

  • Winner, Ayala Emmett, Going to America Under the Jacaranda Tree

    Honorable Mention, Maura Hanrahan, Caboto 500

  • Winner, Don Mitchell, John Brown's Body

    Honorable Mention, Eugene Mendonsa, Blood on the Tractor

  • Winner, Don Mitchell, John Brown's Body

    Honorable Mention, Eugene Mendonsa, Blood on the Tractor

  • Winner, Nancy Lindisfarne, The Tortoise

    Honorable Mention, Paul Johnson, The Knife

  • Winner, Simone Isadora Flynn, A Feast of Mangoes

    Honorable Mention, Bruce T. Grindal, Is There a Light in My Eyes?

  • Winner, Paul Heinrich, The Informant

    Honorable Mention, C. Springwater, The Stories of Red Clay: Man of the Mesa

    Honorable Mention, Linda Williamson, Circle of White

  • Winner, Loretta Orion, The Siberian Shaman's Dress

    Honorable Mention, Kirin Narayan, Come Out And Serve

  • Co-Winner, Kate Altork, Working Norman's Birthday

    Co-Winner, Maria Nieves Zedeno, Saint versus the Hummingbird

  • Winner, Susan Scott-Stevens, The Djinn Tree

    Honorable Mention, Grant A. Olson, The Switchmaster

  • Winner, Michael Hittman, A Pair of Aces and One Deuce

    Honorable Mention, Martha B. Kendall, The Nature of the Evidence

  • 1st Prize, Ernest Schusky, Korean Exodus

    2nd Prize, Yesim Ternar, Christians on the Beach

    Honorable Mention, Catherine Callaghan, Ecket

  • Winner, Barbara Tedlock, Keeping the Breath Nearby

    Honorable Mention, Sarah Waldorf, The Pig Men

*should you have an addition or correction, please contact societyforhumanisticanthro@gmail.com