FRANTZ FANON DISSERTATION AWARD

PURPOSE

The Frantz Fanon Dissertation Award is named in honor of Frantz Fanon and his significant and enduring scholarship informing decolonial, postcolonial, and anti-colonial studies. His work is well known for his analysis of colonialism, particularly its intersections with the psycho-existential, affective, the body, liberation struggles, and collective resistance.

The Decolonial, Postcolonial, and Anti-colonial Studies in Education SIG seeks to advance situated thought and praxis that interrogate colonialism, neo-colonialism, capitalism, heteropatriarchy, and imperialism as an entangled structure of domination and exploitation. The SIG also engages the challenges and possibilities of ongoing struggles for liberation and decolonization, global justice, and solidarity in education and beyond. Following Fanon and other committed scholars of modernity/coloniality, SIG members have also explored questions of domination, power, resistance, systemic racism, injustice, knowledge and power, political economy, and the role of curriculum and pedagogy in reproducing or contesting coloniality. This award thus encourages relational and entangled modes of analyzing and interpreting the logics of capital, colonialism, nationalism, cultural/racial supremacy, patriarchy, hetero-normativity, ableism, international development, and the politics of knowledge production.

In support of our mission statement, this award will act as a catalyst for the advancement of scholarship that is politically, ethically, and theoretically committed to critiquing and unsettling modernity, colonialism, racial capitalism, and heteropatriarchy in their multiple configurations, particularly in relation to education, curriculum, and pedagogy, broadly conceived. Furthermore, the award will encourage emerging discourses and praxes based on decolonial, postcolonial, and anti-colonial studies across geographies. The winner will receive a plaque, travel funds, and will be formally recognized by the SIG and AERA at the SIG’s Annual Meeting.

The Frantz Fanon Dissertation Award is intended for a recent graduate (defined as someone who successfully defended their dissertation two years before the deadline for nominations) who submits a synthesis of their dissertation that contributes to the area(s) of Decolonial, Postcolonial, and Anti-Colonial Studies in Education SIG).

ELIGIBILITY CRITERIA

The committee welcomes dissertation research that illuminates diverse perspectives and methodologies from multiple educational contexts and geographies that critique colonialism and its multiple expressions (e.g., postcolonial, neocolonial, settler colonial).

1. Dissertations must have been successfully defended within the two years leading up to the deadline for nominations.
2. The dissertation should focus primarily on education, be timely and relevant to the emerging fields of decolonial, postcolonial, and anti-colonial studies in education, and demonstrate high-level scholarship.
3. Nomination is not complete until all materials are submitted.
4. Award is one-time only.
5. Nominees who have not previously been selected as award recipients may reapply each year if they meet eligibility requirements.
6. Current SIG officers are ineligible.
7. Correspondence throughout the application/nomination process will be by email; therefore, all information provided by the applicant or nominator must be correct and valid.
8. Self-nominations are encouraged.

NOMINATION PROCESS AND TIMELINE

Nominations for the award will be solicited via the SIG Listserv, social media, and website. To nominate an eligible dissertation, a letter of nomination attesting to the quality of the dissertation should be emailed to the Award Committee Chair. The nomination letter should address how the dissertation advances research in decolonial, postcolonial, and anti-colonial studies in education. The timeline for nominations is September 1st, and the closing date for nominations is November 1st. The nomination packet will include:

1. A formal letter of nomination prepared by the Dissertation Chair/Advisor acknowledging the date of the nominee's successful defense, including the completeness and overall quality of the dissertation.
2. A 2–3-page summary of the dissertation prepared by the nominee that provides an overview of the dissertation, including specifically how the research exemplifies decolonial, postcolonial, and anti-colonial education research and scholarship.
3. Dissertation Title Page and Table of Contents.
4. ONE chapter of the dissertation (nominee’s choice).
5. All materials MUST be submitted in ONE email with the subject line: SIG Award Nomination to the Awards Committee Chair no later than November 1 @11:59PM EST.

Awards Committee

Michael Singh, PhD, michaelsingh@ucdavis.edu (Awards Committee Chair)

Dinorah Sanchez Loza, PhD, sanchezloza.1@osu.edu 

María Belén Hernando Llorens, PhD, belen-hernando@uiowa.edu