Application deadline: Friday, January 30, 2026
The Center for Theoretical Inquiry in the Humanities seeks submissions for the William Slaymaker Graduate Essay Prize. We are looking for work that:
- engages questions that have theoretical import in a range of humanistic disciplines (for example, questions about text and interpretation, about varieties of critique, about forms of knowledge and their limits, about the nature of semiotic systems and their historical embodiment);
- treats these questions substantially;
- offers innovative conceptual insights; and
- does so in clear, compelling prose.
The author of the successful essay will be honored at a colloquium and receive a prize of $1,000. Where appropriate, faculty members at the Center will lend their support in helping the essay to publication.
To be eligible for the award, the author must be a graduate student currently registered at IUB seeking a degree. (In cases of co-authorship, this must be true of all authors.) The essay should be no longer than 7,500 words (references included) and may not have been published before. Please email submissions in Word or PDF format to Michel Chaouli (chaouli@iu.edu) by Friday, January 30, 2026.
Two other faculty members join the director on the jury: Akin Adesokan (Media School) and Carlos Colmenares Gil (Comparative Literature).
