2023 SACRPH Awards Competition
To see past prize winners, click on the title of each prize, or see full descriptions for years 2021, 2019, 2017.
The Society for American City and Regional Planning History invites submissions for its biennial awards competition. Please see below for more information about how to submit a nomination. August 1, 2023, is the deadline for submissions to be considered for our 2023 awards. Our 2021 award winners can be found here.
SACRPH presents awards for scholarship on North American city and regional planning history in several categories, including the Lewis Mumford Prize for best book, the John Reps Prize for best dissertation and master’s thesis, the Catherine Bauer-Wurster prize for best article, and the Journal of Planning History Prize for best article published in that journal. For this year’s competition, we consider work published in the past two years (that is, between August 1, 2021, and July 31, 2023). We also award the Laurence Gerckens Prize to an outstanding teacher-scholar who has demonstrated sustained excellence in scholarship, teaching, and leadership in the field of planning history.
SACRPH will consider the relevance of the following factors when evaluating nominations of written work (published articles and books, as well as completed dissertations and theses):
- Centrality of city and regional planning history in a North American context (inclusive of internationally comparative and transnational work);
- Innovation in building upon scholarship that has been central to SACRPH, while also showing where future research might go;
- Significance in moving beyond analysis of a single case study alone to also offer insights into larger patterns and historical phenomena;
- Appropriately attentive to issues of diversity and equity (or produces new understandings of previously examined processes by making diversity or equity central to the analysis); and,
- Accessible, engaging, and high-quality writing.
In accepting an award, the prize winner indicates their willingness to serve on a prize committee in the following award cycle.
Laurence Gerckens Prize ($250)
For an outstanding teacher-scholar who has demonstrated sustained excellence in scholarship, teaching, and leadership in the field of city and regional planning history. We welcome experimental and innovative experience in any or all of these three areas.
2023 Gerckens Committee: Nancy Kwak, University of California, San Diego; Julian Chambliss, Michigan State University; June Manning Thomas, University of Michigan
Deadline: August 1, 2023
Lewis Mumford Prize ($250)
Awarded to the best book on American city and regional planning history published between August 1, 2021 and July 31, 2023.
2023 Mumford Committee: LaDale Winling, Virginia Tech University; Karilyn Crockett, MIT; Sara Safransky, Vanderbilt University
Deadline: August 1, 2023 (All submissions must be postmarked by August 1st; please send as soon as possible; book submissions must be mailed to committee members; mailing addresses available upon submission at the link below).
Catherine Bauer Wurster Prize ($250)
Awarded to the best scholarly article on American city and regional planning history in any journal, published between August 1, 2021 and July 31, 2023 (using original online publication date).
2023 Bauer Wurster Committee:
Stephanie Ryberg-Webster, Cleveland State University; Dylan Gottlieb, Bentley University; Rosemary Ndubuizu, Georgetown University
Deadline: August 1, 2023
John Reps Prizes ($250)
Awarded to the best doctoral dissertation in American city and regional planning history, and to the best master’s thesis in American city and regional planning history, completed between August 1, 2021 and July 31, 2023.
2023 Reps Committee: Evan Friss, James Madison University; Michael Glass, Boston College; Emily Lieb, Seattle University
Deadline: August 1, 2023
Journal of Planning History Prize ($250)
Awarded to the best article published in the Journal of Planning History, published between August 1, 2021 and July 31, 2023 (using original online publication date).
2023 JPH Committee: Susanna Schaller, City College of New York; Damon Scott, Miami University; and Angel Nieves, Northeastern University
This prize does not require formal submission, as the 2023 JPH Committee will consider all articles published in the Journal of Planning History between August 1, 2021 and July 31, 2023.