The Association of Middle East Anthropology (AMEA) is pleased to announce the winners for our bi-annual book award. This award is given to an anthropological work published in 2022 or 2023 that features creative ethnographic writing, innovative data collection strategies, and sophisticated analysis.
The recipient of this year’s award is Nomi Stone, for Pinelandia: An Anthropology and Field Poetics of War and Empire (University of California Press)
This remarkable book turns an ethnographic lens on the American empire and its military, tracing their combat training in North Carolina and their imaginaries about how Iraqi individuals can be mobilized as human technologies of conquest. Stone’s searing insights into American military culture are illuminated by moving poetry and beautiful prose.
The honorable mention goes to Amahl Bishara, for Crossing a Line: Laws, Violence, and Roadblocks to Palestinian Political Expression (Stanford University Press)
Bishara offers us a riveting account of the myriad ways in which Palestinians on both sides of the Green Line manage and contest the fragmentation of the Palestinian people. Highlighting the physical and bureaucratic barriers which Palestinians have to cross, with her engaging prose, Bishara illuminates both the difficulties and the hopes of crossing lines to work for better futures.
Please join us in congratulating our winners at the AMEA business meeting (online) at MESA, Friday, 15 November 2024, 1:30-2:30pm. Please email satshan1@swarthmore.edu for the zoom link.