Sunday, April 3, 2011

Lillian Smith Book Awards: List of Nominees Released


The Southern Regional Council (SRC) recently announced that forty-eight books have been nominated for the Lillian Smith Book Awards for 2011, to be presented in Decatur, Georgia on September 4, 2011.


SRC is an inter-racial organization founded in 1919 to combat racial injustice in the South. SRC initiated the Lillian Smith Book Awards shortly after Smith's death in 1966 to recognize authors whose writing extends the legacy of the outspoken writer, educator and social critic who challenged her fellow Southerners and all Americans on issues of social and racial justice. Since 2004 the awards have been presented by SRC in a partnership with the University of Georgia Libraries, whose Hargrett Rare Book and Manuscript Library houses a historic collection of Lillian Smith's letters and manuscripts. The Georgia Center for the Book became a partner in 2007, when the awards ceremony first became part of the Decatur Book Festival.


The number of nominations is up this year, in comparison to the forty-three nominations for 2010, apparently reflecting a growing interest in the awards. The award recipients for 2010 were Lynching and Spectacle: Witnessing Racial Violence in America, 1890-1940 by Amy Louise Wood and The Price of Defiance: James Meredith and the Integration of Ole Miss by Charles Eagles.


The 2011 nominees include:


Killing Time: An 18-year Odyssey From Death Row to Freedom John Hollway and Ronald M. Gauthier Skyhorse Publishing

The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness Michelle Alexander The New Press

Crave Radiance: New and Selected Poems 1990-2010 Elizabeth Alexander Graywolf Press

Skin, Inc.: Identity Repair Poems Thomas Sayers Ellis Graywolf Press

Missing You, Metropolis Gary Jackson Graywolf Press

The Queen of Palmyra: A Novel Minrose Gwin HarperCollins Publishers

The Eyes of Willie McGee: A Tragedy of Race, Sex, and Secrets in the Jim Crow South Alex Heard HarperCollins Publishers

Father Dirt Mihaela Moscaliuc Alice James Books

Phantom Noise Brian Turner Alice James Books

Shahid Reads His Own Palm Reginald Dwayne Betts Alice James Books

At The Dark End of the Street: Black Women, Rape, and Resistance – A New History of the Civil Rights Movement from Rosa Parks to the Rise of Black Power Danielle L. McGuire Alfred A. Knopf

Girl in Translation: A Novel Jean Kwok GP Putnam’s Sons/Riverhead Books

The Gendarme: A Novel Mark T. Mustian GP Putnam’s Sons/Riverhead Books

Yellow Dirt: An American Story of a Poisoned Land and a People Betrayed Judy Pasternak Free Press/Simon and Schuster

Long Way Home: A Young Man Lost in the System and the Two Women Who Found Him Laura Caldwell Free Press/Simon and Schuster

Tattoos on the Heart: The Power of Boundless Compassion Gregory Boyle Free Press/Simon and Schuster

Olivia’s Story: The Conspiracy of Heroes Behind Shelley v. Kraemer Jeffrey S. Copland Paragon House

Partly Colored: Asian Americans and Racial Anomaly in the Segregated South Leslie Bow New York University Press

Love and Strange Horses Nathalie Handal University of Pittsburgh Press

Coming of Age in Utopia: The Odyssey of an Idea Paul M. Gaston NewSouth Books

Weepin’ Time: Voices of Slavery in Coastal Georgia Rand Wood Tuttle iUniverse

Our White Boy Jerry Craft with Kathleen Sullivan Texas Tech University Press

Signs of the Times: The Visual Politics of Jim Crow Elizabeth Abel University of California Press

The Indignant Generation: A Narrative of African American Writers and Critics, 1934-1960 Lawrence P. Jackson Princeton University Press

The Warm of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America’s Great Migration Isabel Wilkerson Random House

Jury Discrimination: The Supreme Court, Public Opinion, and a Grassroots Fight for Racial Equality in Mississippi Christopher Waldrep University of Georgia Press

Sitting In and Speaking Out: Student Movement in the American South 1960-1970 Jeffrey A. Turner University of Georgia Press

Beyond Katrina: A Meditation on the Mississippi Gulf Coast Natasha Trethewey University of Georgia Press

Rabble Rousers: The American Far Right in the Civil Rights Era Clive Webb University of Georgia Press

Colonial Georgia and the Creeks: Anglo-Indian Diplomacy on the Southern Frontier, 1733-1763 John T. Juricek University Press of Florida

Reconstituting Whiteness: The Mississippi State Sovereignty Commission Jenny Irons Vanderbilt University Press

To Right These Wrongs: The North Carolina Fund and the Battle to End Poverty and Inequality in 1960s America Robert R. Korstad & James L. Leloudis University of North Carolina Press

Right to Ride: Streetcar Boycotts and African American Citizenship in the Era of Plessy v. Ferguson Blair L. M. Kelley University of North Carolina Press

The Admirable Radical: Staughton Lynd and Cold War Dissent, 1945-1970 Carl Mirra The Kent State University Press

Speak Truth to Power: The Story of Charles Patrick, A Civil Rights Pioneer Mignette Y. Patrick Dorsey University of Alabama Press

Sacrifice Zones: The Front Lines of Toxic Chemical Exposure in the United States Steve Lerner The MIT Press

Benching Jim Crow: The Rise and Fall of the Color Line in Southern College Sports, 1890-1980 Charles H. Martin University of Illinois Press

Carry the Rock: Race, Football, and the Soul of an American City Jay Jennings Rodale

Freedom Flyers: The Tuskegee Airmen of World War II J. Todd Moye Oxford University Press

Freedwomen and The Freedmen’s Bureau: Race, Gender, & Public Policy in the Age of Emancipation Mary Farmer-Kaiser Fordham University Press

Bridges of Reform: Interracial Civil Rights Activism in the Twentieth-Century Los Angeles Shana Bernstein Oxford University Press

The Color of American Has Changed: How Racial Diversity Shaped Civil Rights Reform in California, 1941-1978 Mark Brilliant Oxford University Press

Downhome Gospel: African American Spiritual Activism in Wiregrass County Jerrilyn McGregory University Press of Mississippi

God-Fearing and Free: A Spiritual History of America’s Cold War Jason W. Stevens Harvard University Press

Confederate Reckoning: Power and Politics in the Civil War South Stephanie McCurry Harvard University Press

Near Andersonville: Winslow Homer’s Civil War Peter H. Wood Harvard University Press

Setting Down the Sacred Past: African-American Race Histories Laurie F. Maffly-Kipp Harvard University Press

Our South: Geographic Fantasy and the Rise of National Literature Jennifer Rae Greeson Harvard University Press

1 comment:

  1. Hmm,
    Wish I had known about this. I would have attempted to get the book "One Day In January" noticed and at least brought up fo consideration.
    "One Day In January" A Collection Of Images Taken At Dr. King's First Memorial Service
    Author: Horace Henry
    http://www.blurb.com/bookstore/detail/1944639

    ReplyDelete