The Neilma Sidney Prize
The Sidney Prize is an annual award given to writers whose work “illuminates one of the great issues of our time.” For example, over this past summer and fall, intellectual heavyweights Steven Pinker and Leon Wieseltier went toe-to-toe in The New Republic over the proper role of science in modern thought. Both argued that, contrary to what blinkered humanities professors might think, science provides insight into nearly everything that matters: from the origin of violence to the decline in civility, from the threat of global warming to the meaning of happiness.
The winner of the 2024 Neilma Sidney Prize will be published in Overland and receive $5000. Two runners-up will each receive $750. The competition is open to writers of any age and nationality, but works must be based on travel in some way. Nominations may be made for either a previously published work or a new piece that has appeared in the preceding month. The deadline for nominations is the last day of each month, and nominations are accepted for both written and visual media.
Winners of the Sidney Prize will be announced on our website in early April, and in our newsletter later this spring. In addition, the winning essayist will be invited to present at our national conference in October in San Diego, and a short talk will be presented at the Society for the History of Technology’s annual meeting next year in Philadelphia.
In addition to the Sidney Prize, SHOT also offers three other awards that recognize outstanding scholarship in the field of the history of technology. The Abbot Payson Usher Prize, for the best scholarly book on the history of technology intended for non-specialist as well as scholarly audiences; the Joan Cahalin Robinson Prize, to honor the best graduate student or early career scholar who presents at our annual meeting for the first time; and the Sidney Edelstein Prize, for an outstanding scholarly article in the field of the history of technology.
In the past, we have offered other awards to honor the best of the magazine essays that are a vital part of our society’s public dialogue. These include the Daily Press Prize, for long-form journalism, the Murray Kempton Memorial Prize, for photojournalism, and the Sidney Hillman Prize, for illuminating one of the great issues of our time: from the search for lasting peace to the need for better housing, medical care, and employment security, from the battle against discrimination to the fight for democracy.