The Board of Directors of Middle East Medievalists (MEM) is pleased to request submissions for its biennial prize for the best book on the medieval Middle East (ca. 500–1500 CE). The prize will be awarded at the 2025 annual meeting of the Middle East Studies Association.
Below is a list of criteria for the upcoming competition:
- Books published between April 1, 2023 and March 31, 2025 are eligible for this year’s prize.
- Books must be non-fiction scholarly monographs based on original research. Works not eligible include edited collections and compilations, proceedings of symposia, new editions of previously published books, bibliographies, dictionaries, textbooks, and surveys. We welcome submissions from scholars working with primary source texts in Arabic, Persian, or any other Middle Eastern language, as well as interdisciplinary studies and studies based on research with documents, manuscripts, and material culture.
- Authors must be current members in good standing of Middle East Medievalists to be considered. To join MEM or renew your membership, please visit our MEMbership page.
To Nominate a Book
Deadline: May 1, 2025
- Authors or publishers should submit a short letter of nomination (preferably in an e-mail) noting the title, publisher, date of publication, and series (if appropriate) to the Chair of the Selection Committee, Abigail Balbale ([email protected]) and the Secretary of MEM Jonathan Brack ([email protected]) by May 1, 2025. We recommend including a PDF of the book (if available) when submitting the letter of nomination.
- Send hard copies of the book to each of the *four* members of the Selection committee, postmarked by May 15 2025. See addresses below:
Prof. Abigail Balbale
Department of Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies
New York University
50 Washington Sq. South
New York, NY 10012
USA
Prof. Ahmed El Shamsy
5459 S Dorchester Ave
Chicago, IL 60615
USA
Dr. Bruno De Nicola
Institute of Iranian Studies
Austrian Academy of Sciences
Wiesingerstraße 4
1010 Vienna
Austria
Prof. Jocelyn Hendrickson
Department of History, Classics, and Religion
University of Alberta
2-25 HM Tory
Edmonton, AB
T6G 2H4
Canada
(A phone number may be required for customs or couriers: +1 780-492-2575)
If you have questions about the prize, please contact Prof. Abigail Balbale ([email protected]).