Beginning in 2008, the Polish Studies Association will award its biannual Kulczycki Prize (formerly the PSA Orbis Prize) for best first book in Polish Studies. The award in in honor of Jerzy Kulczycki, whose generous donations have made the prize possible.

The Polish Studies Association seeks nominations for its Biennial Kulczycki Prize in Polish Studies. The prize is intended to recognize outstanding scholarship in a book on Poland or the Poles, in the humanities or the social sciences. Additionally, the author must be in the early stages of her or his career and this must be his or her first authored book.

The closing date for nominations is June 15, 2008. Nominations are limited to works in English published in the two years prior to the closing date (June 15, 2006 to June 15, 2008). The prize, in the amount of $500, will be awarded at the PSA's Business Meeting during the Annual Convention of the American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies in Philadelphia in November, 2008.

A letter of nomination (from the author or from the press), the curriculum vitae of the author, and three copies of the work nominated should be sent to the Chair of the Prize Committee.
Chair: John Connelly
Department of History
Universty of California, Berkeley
3228 Dwinelle Hall
Berkeley, CA 94720-2550
jfconnel@berkeley.edu

Committee members:    Beth Holmgren, Duke University; Arista Cirtautas, University

2005 -6: Marci Shore, Caviar and Ashes: A Warsaw Generation's Life and Death in Marxism, 1918-1968 and Alison Frank, Oil Empire: Visions of Prosperity in Austrian Galicia

2003-4: Gunnar S. Paulsson, Secret City: The Hidden Jews of Warsaw, 1940-1945

2001-2:

1999-2000: Brian Porter, When Nationalism Began to Hate 

1997-8: Anna Cioffi, Alternative Theatre in Poland 1954-1989 

1995-1996: Grzegorz Ekiert, The State Against Society 

1993-4: Jan Kubik, The Power of Symbols against the Symbols of Power 

The winner of the 2006 prize for the best aritcle in Polish Studies was Patrice Dabrowski for her article, “’Discovering’ the Galician Borderlands: The Case of the Eastern Carpathians,” in the 2005 volume of Slavic Review.

The prize committee stated: “Patrice Dabrowski’s article uses the concept of “discovery” to asses the ways Polish lowlanders and Ruthenians alike utilized the image of the East Carpathian Hutsuls in the 1880s for very divergent ends. Relying on ethnographic and travel literature, the article is well-situated in theoretical studies of identity formation and is chock full of colorful detail about the culture of these highlanders. In the end, Patrice argues that the 1880s “discovery” of the Hutsuls by the Galician Polish elite was incomplete in that these mountaineers were not fully integrated into the evolving Polish nation, but rather were eventually absorbed by Ukrainian nationalists. Along the way, however, she provides abundant material for scholars of Poland, Ukraine, and the Habsburg Monarchy, and an analysis of borderlands people that has even broader reach. The piece is gracefully written and accessible to undergraduates, while also offering much to the specialist.”