The Society for Classical Studies is offering a prize for the best graduate research paper on multiculturalism in the ancient Mediterranean.

A number of graduate students at Northern Illinois University work on ancient, late antique, and early medieval history. Some of the graduate students in my recent HIST 790 Research Seminar on Religious Politics and Sectarian Violence may be interested in applying for this prize. Any NIU students who wish to apply for this prize should feel free to contact me for assistance in preparing their submissions.

Here is the call for submissions for the Gruen Prize from the Society for Classical Studies:

On behalf of the Society for Classical Studies (SCS), the Erich S. Gruen Prize Committee invites all graduate students in North America to enter the second annual competition for the best graduate research paper on multiculturalism in the ancient Mediterranean. This year the prize will be a cash award of $500. 

The prize is intended to honor Erich S. Gruen, renowned ancient historian and long-time Gladys Rehard Wood Professor of History and Classics at the University of California, Berkeley. Professor Gruen was born in Vienna in 1935 and came to the United States in 1939. One of the most respected and beloved scholars in the field, he has made lasting contributions to our understanding of ethnicity, identity, and exchange in the multicultural ancient Mediterranean world. Professor Gruen has served on the dissertation committees of over one hundred Ph.D. students, and he continues to correspond with and support them long after graduation, as scholars and as people. He also touches the lives of countless other scholars across the world through his tireless traveling, mentorship, and service to the profession, including as president of the American Philological Association (now the Society for Classical Studies) in 1992. 

In honor of all these achievements and with the help of his former students, the SCS Board has set up an award in order to celebrate Professor Gruen’s continuing contributions to the field. We therefore invite high-quality papers treating any aspect of race, ethnicity, or cultural exchange as it pertains to the ancient Mediterranean by any student currently enrolled in a North American graduate program, regardless of citizenship or immigration status. A Prize Committee has been charged with selecting the most original and well-argued research paper to receive a cash award and public recognition by SCS. Membership in SCS and/or attendance at the annual meeting are not expected or required of any applicant.

The 2021 Gruen Prize Competition Guidelines

The deadline for submissions is October 8, 2021. Essays must be work that can stand alone without requiring summaries of omitted sections. They should not exceed the length of 30 pages, including notes but excluding bibliography and illustrations or figures. Text must be double-spaced in 12-point font with 1-inch margins; notes may be single-spaced and must be displayed as footnotes. Authors must remove their names from essays. Electronic submission via Google form is required unless prior arrangements have been made for good reason with the committee. Essays should be submitted in PDF format by direct upload using the Google form found here.

The Gruen Prize is intended to encourage new avenues of intellectual development and the graduate-level mentorship that supports and nurtures it. Submissions should therefore not be previously published, in full or in part, and authors who already have Ph.D. in hand by October 8, 2021, are ineligible. SCS reserves the right not to confer the prize in any year in which no suitable candidate is found. The winner of the 2021 Gruen Prize will be selected by a jury.  Please direct to both Nandini Pandey (nandini.pandey@wisc.edu) and Kristen Seaman (kseaman@uoregon.edu) remaining questions regarding eligibility, requirements, submission, or other matters.

For more information, see the Society for Classical Studies website.