The Society for Albanian Studies is pleased to announce that the 2019 Stavro Skendi Book Prize for Achievement in Albanian Studies is awarded to Michael L. Galaty for his book Memory and NationBuilding: From Ancient Times to the Islamic State.
A comprehensive but accessible study of how states appropriate collective memory, Memory and Nation Building offers rich insights drawn from Albania, Greece, and Egypt. Galaty takes seriously the differences in state-building practices in each of these cases, tying such differences to dissimilar responses to collective memory and the political uses of memory production. The 2019 Prize Committee praised the breadth and depth of Galaty’s suggestive study, which draws from a variety of disciplines including anthropology, archaeology, psychology, history, nationalism theories, and fiction. The committee was particularly impressed by the study’s ambitious comparative commitment, which situates Albanian memory practices within a broader post-Ottoman and Mediterranean context. Memory and Nation Building notably adopts a diachronic approach, making connections from prehistory to the present. Additionally, it reveals the importance of crossing national borders by exploring neglected and under studied communities such as Greek-Albanians and Albanian-Egyptian minorities.
Memory and Nation Building offers rich insights drawn from Albania, Greece, and Egypt. Galaty takes seriously the differences in state-building practices in each of these cases, tying such differences to dissimilar responses to collective memory and the political uses of memory production
About the author: Michael L. Galaty is Professor of Anthropology in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Michigan and directs the University of Michigan’s Museum of Anthropological Archaeology.
The Society for Albanian Studies is pleased to announce that the 2019 Arshi Pipa Graduate Student Paper Award is awarded to Eneos Çarka for the essay “East-West-East: When the Ship Comes In.” The winning essay is derived from the author’s MA thesis in Film Studies at University College London.
The Society for Albanian Studies 