The Folklore and Science Section of the American Folklore Society invites submissions for the Folklore and Science Prizes. The deadline for submissions is July 1.
Folklore & Science Prizes are awarded to presentation-length papers (approximately 10 pages of text), focusing on the boundaries, intersections, and interdisciplinary exchanges between folklore and science. Before submitting, individuals are encouraged to:
- Peruse the Folklore and Science Section’s mission statement
- Join the Folklore and Science Section
- View the Prize Committee’s submission-evaluation rubric.
The Folklore & Science Prize Committee awards two prizes: one to senior scholars (including, for example, academic faculty and public folklore/humanities professionals) and one to junior scholars (including, for example, graduate and undergraduate students). Each winner will be formally awarded a $400 prize at that year’s American Folklore Society conference. Senior prize winners will be asked to present their paper alongside a group of interdisciplinary scholars (with relevance to the paper’s topic) at the Folklore & Science section’s virtual panel the following January.
Winners will be announced by September 1st and formally announced during the American Folklore Society Annual Meeting. Before submitting, please remove personal identifiers from paper body and citations. Submissions should include a cover letter (containing contact information and a brief (100 words) explanation of how the paper addresses the boundaries, intersections, and/or interdisciplinary exchanges between folklore and science) and the anonymized paper, both compiled into a single PDF file. To submit, please use the AFS Prize Application Form. For any technical questions related to the submission, please send an email to AFS Executive Director Jessica Turner (jturner@afsnet.org).
If you’re wondering if your paper or idea fits within the purview of this prize, you may direct questions to Sandi Atwood (sandra.atwood@lethbridgecollege.ca) and Daisy Ahlstone (daisy.ahlstone@gmail.com), the Folklore & Science Prize Subcommittee coordinators. Do not send your submissions directly to Sandi or Daisy; submissions must be anonymous, so doing so will disqualify your paper. Instead, all applications should be submitted via the AFS Prize Application Form linked above.