New Scholars' Prize

 

 

 

 

 

Call for Papers 

 

 

 

ISTR runs an annual essay competition for New Scholars. There is no set theme for this competition; rather, candidates are encouraged to submit work drawing on their current research. New research, or essays developed from papers presented at the preceding conference are acceptable. The New Scholars' Prize is awarded to the best essay, judged on originality, coherence and rigour.

 

Essays must not exceed 4000 words (excluding bibliography) and should not be published or submitted for publication in advance of the award announcement. Candidates should submit entries in English electronically as an e-mail attachment. They will be judged anonymously; hence, the author's name must not appear anywhere in the essay itself. All submissions must be accompanied by a cover sheet, must be presented with attention to correct spelling and stylistics and referenced according to a standard norm (i.e. MLA or Chicago style). Send entries, preferably in Word format, to the Convenor of the Prize Committee, Dr. Fiona Fearon, Dundalk Institute of Technology (Fiona.Fearon@dkit.ie).

 

Eligibility: A New Scholar is defined as a graduate student or post-doctoral researcher whose PhD has been completed less than three years ago or a researcher without a PhD who has been in an academic post for less than three years. Membership of ISTR is not necessary to enter the competition, but prize winners will need to join ISTR to attend the conference.

 

Deadline: 1 June 2013. The judges for the New Scholars' Prize in 2013 are Dr. Ondrej Pilný, Associate Professor and Director of the Centre for Irish Studies, Charles University, Prague; Dr. Sharon Phelan, IT Tralee, and Dr. Fiona Fearon, DKiT. A final adjudicator will be appointed to select from the short listed essays at a later date. Prof. Helen Burke was the adjudicator in 2012.

 

Results of the competition will be announced at the next ISTR conference in Birkbeck, University of London, November 2013. The prize-winner is expected to make their own travel and accommodation arrangements. 

 

Cover Sheet 2013 

 

 

 

Past Winners

 

 

 

2012

 

 

 

Christopher Collins

 

 

"'The Cries of Pagan Desperation': J.M. Synge and the Discontents of Historical Time".

 

Christopher completed his Ph.D on the plays of J.M. Synge at Trinity College Dublin in 2012. He is a Trinity College Dublin Gold Medalist. With Mary P. Caulfield he's editing a collection of essays entitled "Ireland, Memory and Performing the Historical Imagination," which is forthcoming in 2013. Christopher currently teaches at Trinity College and The Lir: The National Academy of Dramatic Art. He also works as a dramaturg and an applied theatre practitioner.

 

 

 

2011

 

 

Aoife McGrath

 

 

"At the edge of the event?: the dance of unfixed thoughts in the work of Jean Butler and Colin Dunne".

 

 

Aoife McGrath is Lecturer in the Drama Department at Queen's University Belfast and recently completed her doctoral studies at Trinity College Dublin. She is a dancer, director and choreographer and has worked as the dance adviser for the Irish Arts Council. Aoife has published several journal articles and book chapters on dance in Ireland and her monograph, Dance Theatre in Ireland: Revolutionary Moves, was published by Palgrave Macmillan in 2012. Her ISTR New Scholars' Prize essay will be published in the Oxford University Press publication, The Oxford Handbook of Dance and Ethnicity (ed. Anthony Shay).