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Girton College William Dusinberre Prize 2025

Girton College

Girton College has established a prize to support and recognise student research and engagement with the legacies and practices of enslavement. The William Dusinberre Prize is made possible by a generous gift from Juliet Dusinberre in memory of her husband, a renowned historian of American slavery.

Engagement with the Legacies and Practices of Enslavement

This new prize responds to the invisibilities of enslavement, both historical and contemporary, and its legacies as manifested across many academic disciplines and beyond. It aims to support and encourage critical academic and reflective work that stimulates curiosity, provokes thought and has the potential to engage diverse audiences.

The competition is open to all students registered at the University of Cambridge during academic years 2023/24 and 2024/25.  The College is keen to encourage submissions prepared during the student’s course of study, including coursework submitted for examination.

Timeline

Competition Opens: During Lent Term 2025

Submission deadline: Wednesday 30 April 2025

Result Announcement: Late Summer 2025

Award Ceremony: to coincide with Black History Month 2025

Guidelines and judging criteria

Entries must be in English.

A submission form (to be issued in due course) will accompany each application.

There is minimum wordcount of 2,500 words and a maximum wordcount of 10,000 words inclusive of footnotes and references.

A prize of £500 will be awarded to the winner of the competition.  The judges in their discretion may divide the prize money among the authors of multiple entries or they may select additional entries for special commendation.

Entries will be assessed in terms of their: 

  • Intellectual or creative sophistication relative to the author’s academic formation. For the purposes of this prize, creative sophistication encompasses matters such as sensitivity to the sources being used, adequate contextualisation, critical engagement, and sufficient complexity of reflection and analysis to do justice to the topic. 
  • Originality
  • Accuracy
  • Quality of research and use of evidence
  • Clarity and importance of research or reflective question
  • Potential to engage publics beyond the author’s discipline. 

Entries may be submitted by authors or nominated by academic staff. 

Submissions must be accompanied by a 250-word summary of why the entry merits consideration for the prize.

Given the nature of the subject area, all candidates are invited to consider the sensitivities of readers by including an introductory note warning of the inclusion of offensive terms or disturbing material, where appropriate.