Vinson Sutlive Book Prize and Lecture

Each year the department awards the Sutlive Book Prize to the best book published in the prior year, in any discipline, that makes use of anthropological perspectives in order to examine historical contexts and/or the role of the past in the present. The author is then invited to campus to present the Sutlive Lecture.

The Department of Anthropology is pleased to announce David Mattingly and Sarah Newman as the joint winners of the 2025 Vinson Sutlive Prize for their books Between Sahara and Sea: Africa in the Roman Empire and Unmaking Waste: New Histories of Old Things. We look forward to hosting Dr. Mattingly and Dr. Newman in the 2025-2026 academic year.

Previous honorees include:

2024: Ned Blackhawk: The Rediscovery of America: Native Peoples and the Unmaking of U.S. History
2023: Lori Allen: A History of False Hope: Investigative Commissions in Palestine
2022: Akinwumi Ogundiran, The Yorùbá: A New History
2021: Mark D. Anderson, From Boas to Black Power: Racism, Liberalism, and American Anthropology
2020: Alireza Doostdar, The Iranian Metaphysicals: Explorations in Science, Islam, and the Uncanny Watch the lecture here: https://youtu.be/KQhn9zuC8sE
2019: Naor Ben-Yehoyada, The Mediterranean Incarnate: Region Formation Between Sicily and Tunisia Since World War II
2018: Gísli Pálsson, The Man Who Stole Himself: The Slave Odyssey of Hans Jonathan
2017: Gillian Feeley-Harnik, Ancient Household Words: Descent from Soil to Blood in Darwin’s England
2016: Engseng Ho, A Moral Economy of Jihad: Pure Castes, Hybrid Law and Creole Society in Indian Ocean Malabar
2015: Arlene Davila, El Mall: The Spatial and Class Politics of Shopping Malls in Latin America

These annual events honor the late Dr. Vinson Sutlive, Professor Emeritus, who taught for thirty years in the Department of Anthropology. When he first arrived he was one of a group of scholars who gave form and substance to the then fledgling program. Over the years he served several times as Department Chair. He taught and mentored many students, such as Karen Prentiss Braun, ‘87, whose generous donation in honor of Dr. Sutlive helped to initiate the events honoring him. Sutlive was also a founder and long-time editor of the journal Studies in Third World Societies, one of the first scholarly vehicles dedicated specifically to the study of non-Western culture and society. He is also known for his work on a comprehensive Dictionary of Iban.

2025 Nominations
The Department of Anthropology at William & Mary is inviting nominations for the annual Vinson Sutlive Book Prize, for works of historical anthropology. The prize is awarded to the best book published in the prior year, in any discipline, that makes use of anthropological perspectives in order to examine historical contexts and/or the role of the past in the present. The author is then invited to campus to present the Sutlive Lecture. The jury is especially seeking the nomination of authors who share the Department of Anthropology’s commitment to struggle with and overcome the white supremacist and colonialist foundations of our discipline and to understand the historical legacies of racism and inequity.

Review of books begins October 1, 2025
We accept both electronic and hard copy submissions, and request that copies in whatever format are made available for each of the three members of the jury. Please send any queries as well as nominations to Professor Jonathan Glasser, Chair, Sutlive Prize committee and Department Chair, at jglasser@wm.edu and Department of Anthropology, William & Mary, PO Box 8795, Williamsburg, Virginia 23187-8795.