Anisfield-Wolf Book Awards

The Anisfield-Wolf Book Awards are an American literary award dedicated to honoring written works that make important contributions to our understanding of racism and our appreciation of the rich diversity of human culture. Established in 1935 by Cleveland poet and philanthropist Edith Anisfield Wolf and originally administered by the Saturday Review, the awards have been administered by the Cleveland Foundation since 1963.

Three or four awards, and sometimes a lifetime achievement award, are given out each year. Notable past winners include Zora Neale Hurston (1943), Langston Hughes (1954), Martin Luther King, Jr. (1959), Maxine Hong Kingston (1978), Wole Soyinka (1983), Nadine Gordimer (1988), Toni Morrison (1988), Ralph Ellison (1992), Edward Said (2000), and Derek Walcott (2004).

Winners of the Anisfeld-Wolf Book Award:

*2008 - Ayaan Hirsi Ali for "Infidel". Due to security concerns because of the death threats against her, the award was not listed beforehand, but was a surprise announcement at the ceremony ["An Interview with Ayaan Hirsi Ali," Karen R. Long, Cleveland Plain Dealer; September 11, 2008 [http://www.cleveland.com/arts/index.ssf/2008/09/an_interview_with_ayaan_hirsi.html web version] accessed Thursday September 11, 2008] .
*2008 – Junot Diaz for " The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao "
*2008 – Mohsin Hamid for " The Reluctant Fundamentalist "
*2008 – William Melvin Kelley , Lifetime Achievement Award
*2007 – Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie for " Half of a Yellow Sun "
*2007 – Taylor Branch for " At Canaan's Edge: America in the King Years, 1965-68 "
*2007 – Martha Collins for " Blue Front: Poems "
*2007 – Scott Reynolds Nelson for " Steel Drivin' Man: John Henry: the Untold Story of an American Legend "
*2006 – Zadie Smith for " On Beauty "
*2006 – Jill Lepore for " New York Burning: Liberty, Slavery, and Conspiracy in Eighteenth-Century Manhattan "
*2006 – William Demby , Lifetime Achievement Award
*2005 – August Wilson , Lifetime Achievement Award
*2005 – Geoffrey C. Ward for " Unforgivable Blackness: The Rise and Fall of Jack Johnson "
*2005 – A. Van Jordan for " MACNOLIA: Poems "
*2005 – Edwidge Danticat for " The Dew Breaker "
*2004 – Derek Walcott , Lifetime Achievement Award
*2004 – Adrian Nicole LeBlanc for " Random Family: Love, Drugs, Trouble, and Coming of Age in the Bronx "
*2004 – Edward P. Jones for " The Known World "
*2004 – Ira Berlin for " Generations of Captivity: A History of African-American Slaves "
*2003 – Reetika Vazirani for " World Hotel "
*2003 – Samantha Power for " A Problem from Hell: America and the Age of Genocide "
*2003 – Adrienne Kennedy , Lifetime Achievement Award
*2003 – Stephen L. Carter for " The Emperor of Ocean Park "
*2002 – Jay Wright, Lifetime Achievement Award
*2002 – Colson Whitehead for " John Henry Days "
*2002 – Vernon E. Jordan Jr., Annette Gordon-Reed for " Vernon Can Read!: A Memoir "
*2002 – Quincy Jones for " Q: The Autobiography of Quincy Jones "
*2001 – F. X. Toole for " Rope Burns: Stories from the Corner "
*2001 – David Levering Lewis for " W. E. B. Du Bois, 1919-1963: The Fight for Equality and the American Century "
*2001 – Lucille Clifton , Lifetime Achievement Award
*2000 – Edward W. Said for " Out of Place: A Memoir "
*2000 – Chang-Rae Lee for " A Gesture Life: A Novel "
*2000 – Ernest Gaines , Lifetime Achievement Award
*1999 – John Lewis, Michael D'Orso for " Walking with the Wind: A Memoir of the Movement "
*1999 – John Hope Franklin , Lifetime Achievement Award
*1999 – Russell Banks for " Cloudsplitter: A Novel "
*1998 – Gordon Parks , Lifetime Achievement Award
*1998 – Walter Mosley for " Always Outnumbered, Always Outgunned "
*1998 – Toi Derricotte for " The Black Notebooks: An Interior Journey "
*1997 – Albert L. Murray , Lifetime Achievement Award
*1997 – James McBride for " The Color of Water 10th Anniversary Edition "
*1997 – Jamaica Kincaid for " Autobiography of My Mother "
*1996 – Dorothy West , Lifetime Achievement Award
*1996 – Madison Smartt Bell for " All Souls' Rising "
*1996 – Jonathan Kozol for " Amazing Grace "
*1995 – William H. Tucker for " The Science and Politics of Racial Research "
*1995 – Brent Staples for " Parallel Time: Growing Up in Black and White "
*1995 – Reginald Gibbons for " Sweetbitter: A Novel "
*1994 – David Levering Lewis for " W. E. B. Du Bois: A Reader "
*1994 – Judith Ortiz Cofer for " The Latin Deli: Prose and Poetry "
*1993 – Marija Alseikaite Gimbutas for " The civilization of the goddess "
*1993 – Sandra Cisneros for " Women Hollering Creek "
*1993 – Kwame Anthony Appiah for " In My Father's House: Africa in the Philosophy of Culture "
*1992 – Marilyn Nelson Waniek for " The Homeplace "
*1992 – Elaine Mensh, Harry Mensh for " The IQ Mythology: Class, Race, Gender, and Inequality "
*1992 – Peter Hayes for " Lessons and Legacies I: The Meaning of the Holocaust in a Changing World "
*1992 – Melissa Fay Greene for " Praying for Sheetrock: A Work of Nonfiction "
*1992 – Ralph Ellison for " Invisible Man ", Special Achievement Award
*1991 – Forrest G. Wood for " Arrogance Of Faith, The: Christianity and Race in America "
*1991 – Walter A. Jackson for " Gunnar Myrdal and America's Conscience: Social Engineering and Racial Liberalism, 1938-1987 "
*1991 – Carol Beckwith, Angela Fisher, Graham Hancock for " African Ark: People and Ancient Cultures of Ethiopia and the Horn of Africa "
*1990 – Dolores Kendrick for " The women of plums: Poems in the voices of slave women "
*1990 – Hugh Honour for " The Image of the Black in Western Art: Part 1 "
*1989 – Peter Sutton for " Dreamings: The Art of Aboriginal Australia "
*1989 – George Lipsitz for " Life In The Struggle 2Nd Pb "
*1989 – Henry Louis Gates Jr. for " Collected Black Women's Narratives "
*1989 – Taylor Branch for " Parting the Waters America in the King Years "
*1988 – Abigail M. Thernstrom for " Whose Votes Count?: Affirmative Action and Minority Voting Rights "
*1988 – Toni Morrison for " Beloved "
*1988 – Walter F. Morris, Jr. for " Living Maya "
*1988 – Nadine Gordimer for " A Sport of Nature "
*1987 – Gail Sheehy for " Spirit of Survival "
*1987 – Arnold Rampersad for " The Life of Langston Hughes "
*1986 – Northland Editors for " Kachinas: A Hopi Artist's Documentary "
*1986 – James North for " FREEDOM RISING "
*1986 – Donald Alexander Downs for " Nazis in Skokie: Freedom, Community and the First Amendment "
*1985 – David S. Wyman for " The Abandonment of the Jews: America and the Holocaust 1941-1945 "
*1985 – Breyten Breytenbach for " Mouroir: Mirrornotes of a Novel "
*1984 – Humbert S. Nelli for " From Immigrants to Ethnics: The Italian Americans "
*1984 – Jose Alcina Franch for " Pre-Columbian Art "
*1983 – Wole Soyinka for " Ake "
*1983 – Richard Rodriguez for " Hunger of Memory: The Education of Richard Rodriguez "
*1982 – Peter J. Powell for " People of the Sacred Mountain "
*1982 – Geoffrey G. Field for " Evangelist of Race: The Germanic Vision of Houston Stewart Chamberlain "
*1981 – Jamake Highwater for " Song from the Earth: American Indian painting "
*1980 – Tepilit Ole Saitoti for " Maasai "
*1980 – Richard Borshay Lee for " The !Kung San: Men, Women and Work in a Foraging Society "
*1980 – Urie Bronfenbrenner for " The Ecology of Human Development: Experiments by Nature and Design "
*1979 – Phillip V. Tobias for " The Bushmen: San hunters and herders of Southern Africa "
*1978 – Maxine Hong Kingston for " The Woman Warrior: Memoirs of a Girlhood Among Ghosts "
*1978 – Allan Chase for " Legacy of Malthus "
*1977 – Michi Weglyn for " Years of Infamy: The Untold Story of America's Concentration Camps "
*1977 – Richard Kluger for " Simple Justice "
*1977 – Jamaica Kincaid for " Autobiography of My Mother "
*1976 – Raphael Patai for " The myth of the Jewish race "
*1976 – Thomas Kiernan for " The Arabs: Their history, aims, and challenge to the industrialized world "
*1976 – Lucy S. Dawidowicz for " The War Against the Jews: 1933-1945 "
*1975 – Leon Poliakov for " The Aryan Myth: A History of Racist and Nationalistic Ideas In Europe "
*1975 – Eugene D. Genovese for " Roll, Jordan, Roll: The World the Slaves Made "
*1974 – Louis Leo Snyder for " The Dreyfus case: A documentary history "
*1974 – Albie Sachs for " Justice in South Africa "
*1974 – Michel Fabre for " The Unfinished Quest of Richard Wright "
*1974 – Charles Duguid for " Doctor and the aborigines "
*1973 – Lee Rainwater for " Behind Ghetto Walls: Black Family Life in a Federal Slum "
*1973 – Betty Fladeland for " Men & Brothers "
*1973 – Pat Conroy for " The Water is Wide "
*1972 – Donald L. Robinson for " Slavery in the structure of American politics, 1765-1820 "
*1972 – Naboth Mokgatle for " The Autobiography of an Unknown South African "
*1972 – David Loye for " The healing of a nation "
*1972 – John S. Haller for " Outcasts from Evolution: Scientific Attitudes of Racial Inferiority, 1859 - 1900 "
*1972 – George M. Fredrickson for " The Black Image in the White Mind: The Debate on Afro-American Character and Destiny, 1817-1914 "
*1971 – Anthony Wallace for " Death and Rebirth of Seneca "
*1971 – Stan Steiner for " La Raza: The Mexican Americans "
*1971 – Carleton Mabee for " Black Freedom: The Nonviolent Abolitionists from 1830 through the Civil War "
*1971 – Robert William July for " A History of the African People "
*1970 – Audrie Girdner for " The Great Betrayal: The Evacuation of the Japanese-Americans during World War II "
*1970 – Florestan Fernandes for " The Negro in Brazilian Society "
*1970 – Vine Deloria for " Custer Died for Your Sins: An Indian Manifesto "
*1970 – Dan T. Carter for " Scottsboro: A Tragedy of the American South "
*1969 – Stuart Levine, Nancy O. Lurie for " The American Indian Today "
*1969 – Leonard Dinnerstein for " The Leo Frank Case "
*1969 – Gwendolyn Brooks for " In the Mecca; Poems "
*1969 – E. Earl Baughman, W. Grant Dahlstrom for " Negro and White Children: A Psychological Study in the Rural South "
*1968 – Erich Kahler for " The Jews among the Nations "
*1968 – Raul Hilberg for " The Destruction of the European Jews "
*1968 – Robert Coles for " Children of Crisis: A Study of Courage and Fear "
*1968 – Norman Rufus Colin Cohn for " Warrant for Genocide: The Myth of the Jewish World Conspiracy and the Protocols of the Elders of Zion "
*1967 – Oscar Lewis for " La Vida "
*1967 – David Brion Davis for " The Problem of Slavery in Western Culture "
*1966 – Amram Scheinfeld for " Your Heredity and Environment "
*1966 – Claude Brown for " Manchild in the Promised Land "
*1966 – Baldry for " Unity Mankind Greek Thought "
*1966 – Alex Haley for " The Autobiography of Malcolm X "
*1965 – James W. Silver for " Mississippi: The Closed Society "
*1965 – Abram L. Sachar for " A History of the Jews, Revised Edition "
*1965 – James M. McPherson for " The Struggle for Equality: Abolitionists and the Negro in the Civil War and Reconstruction "
*1965 – Milton M. Gordon for " Assimilation in American Life: The Role of Race, Religion and National Origins "
*1964 – Bernard E. Olson for " Faith and Prejudice "
*1964 – Harold R. Isaacs for " The New World of Negro Americans "
*1964 – Nathan Glazer, Daniel P. Moynihan for " Beyond the Melting Pot, Second Edition: The Negroes, Puerto Ricans, Jews, Italians, and Irish of New York City "
*1963 – Theodosius Dobzhansky for " Mankind Evolving "
*1962 – John Howard Griffin for " Black Like Me "
*1962 – Dwight L. Dumond for " Antislavery: The Crusade for Freedom in America "
*1962 – Gina Allen for " The Forbidden Man "
*1961 – Louis B. Lomax for " The Reluctant African "
*1961 – E. R. Braithwaite for " To Sir with Love "
*1960 – John Haynes Holmes for " I Speak for Myself "
*1960 – Basil Davidson for " Lost Cities of Africa "
*1959 – George Eaton Simpson, J. Milton Yinger for " Racial and Cultural Minorities:: An Analysis of Prejudice and Discrimination "
*1959 – Martin Luther King Jr. for " Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story "
*1958 – South African Institute of Race Relations for " Handbook on Race Relations "
*1958 – Jessie B. Sams for " White Mother "
*1957 – Father Trevor Huddleston for " Naught for Your Comfort "
*1957 – Gilberto Freyre for " The Masters and the Slaves: A Study in the Development of Brazilian Civilization "
*1956 – George W. Shepherd for " They Wait in Darkness "
*1956 – John P. Dean, Alex Rosen for " Manual of Intergroup Relations "
*1955 – Lyle Saunders for " Cultural Differences and Medical Care "
*1955 – Oden for " Meeker "
*1954 – Langston Hughes for " Simple Takes a Wife "
*1954 – Vernon Bartlett for " Struggle for Africa "
*1953 – Han Suyin for " Many Splendoured Thing "
*1953 – Farley Mowat for " People of the Deer "
*1952 – Laurens Van Der Post for " Venture to the Interior "
*1952 – Brewton Berry for " Race Relations "
*1951 – John Hersey for " The Wall "
*1951 – Henry Gibbs for " Twilight in South Africa "
*1950 – Shirley Graham for " Your Most Humble Servant "
*1950 – S. Andhil Fineberg for " Punishment Without Crime "
*1949 – Alan Paton for " Cry, the Beloved Country "
*1949 – J.C. Furnas for " Anatomy of Paradise "
*1948 – Worth Tuttle Hedden for " The Other Room "
*1948 – Kenneth R. Philp for " John Collier's Crusade for Indian Reform, 1920-1954 "
*1947 – Pauline R. Kibbe for " Latin Americans in Texas "
*1947 – Sholem Asch for " Prophet "
*1946 – Wallace Stegner for " One Nation "
*1946 – St. Clair Drake for " Black Metropolis: A Study of Negro Life in a Northern City "
*1945 – Kenneth B. Clark for " Dark Ghetto: Dilemmas of Social Power "
*1945 – Gwethalyn Graham for " Earth and High Heaven "
*1944 – Ronald Takaki for " A Different Mirror: A History of Multicultural America "
*1944 – Maurice Samuel for " The World of Sholom Aleichem "
*1944 – Roi Ottley for " New World A-Coming "
*1943 – Zora Neale Hurston for " Dust Tracks on a Road: An Autobiography "
*1942 – James G. Leyburn for " The Haitian People "
*1942 – Leopold Infeld for " Quest: An Autobiography "
*1941 – Louis Adamic for " From Many Lands "
*1940 – Edward Franklin Frazier for " The Negro Family in the United States "
*1937 – Julian Huxley for " We Europeans "
*1936 – Harold Foote Gosnell for " Negro Politicians: Rise of Negro Politics in Chicago "

External links

* [http://www.anisfield-wolf.org/ Official website]
* [http://www.lovethebook.com/Awards.aspx?bookaward=Anisfield-Wolf%20Book%20Awards Anisfield-Wolf Book Awards at lovethebook]