The Rutledge Prize 2010: For Graduate Students Giving Papers at the SCLA Conference

Each year the Southern Comparative Literature Association offers a prize of $100 for the most promising work presented at its annual conference by a graduate student. The essay is also considered for publication in The Comparatist.

You may submit a paper for consideration for this award by sending it as an email attachment to the SLCA vice president. The deadline for submissions is November 15, 2011 with the prizewinner to be announced in the 2012 issue of The Comparatist. Send to: Prof. Nicole Simek, simeknj@whitman.edu.

Since conference papers are often shortened from longer projects, students are encouraged to submit an essay-length version of their work that would be suitable for journal publication (no longer than 7,500 words). If publishable, prize essays normally appear in the next issue after the official announcement (i.e., a year and a half after the conference presentation), thus allowing ample time for feedback and advice from the editor.

Rutledge Prize Winner 2010

Jennifer Slobodian, University of South Carolina

"Analyzing the Woman Auteur: The Female/Feminist Gazes of Isabel Coixet and Lucrecia Martel."

Judges' Citation

"This essay presents a sophisticated analysis of Coixet and Martel's challenges to gender normativity in the field of cinema, a field increasingly marked by transcultural contact and transformation. Slobodian ably integrates her theoretical framework with her careful close readings, developing a convincing critical comparison of the feminist gaze that unsettles assumptions about the First World/Third World divide."

Harry C. Rutledge, Emeritus Professor of Classics at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, and an internationally recognized classicist, was the guiding spirit behind the founding of the Southern Comparative Literature Association March 28–30, 1974. He served as President, Board Member, and Conference Coordinator, but is best remembered for his enthusiasm in encouraging comparative work of all kinds. He also helped inspire the founding of The Comparatist.