AJHS Academic Awards
The American Jewish Historical Society encourages interested students and scholars to apply for the following prizes and fellowships. Please note that the AJHS Academic Council is responsible for all selections.
Saul Viener Book Prize
The Saul Viener Book Prize is awarded biannually by the American Jewish Historical Society Academic Council to honor outstanding books focused on the history of Jews in the Americas. This year’s Viener prize committee was privileged to review a wide array of books that dug deep into American Jewish experience, moving often overlooked subjects to the center of the field.
The next Saul Viener prize will be awarded in late spring 2025. Criteria for submissions will be posted late January 2025.
The Viener Prize recipient for 2021/22 was Nathaniel Deutsch and Michael Casper’s A Fortress in Brooklyn: Race, Real Estate, and the Making of Hasidic Williamsburg.
This year, the committee has selected two additional books as worthy of honorable mention:
- American Shtetl, The Making of Kiryas Joel, a Hasidic Village in Upstate New York, by David Myers and Nomi Stolzenberg
- Once We Were Slaves: The Extraordinary Journey of a Multiracial Jewish Family, by Laura Arnold Leibman
Karla Goldman (chair), Bruce Haynes, Rebecca Kobrin, James Loeffler, Saul Veiner Book Prize Committee 2023
Wasserman Essay Prize
The Wasserman Essay Prize is awarded yearly for the best article published in a one of the four annual issues of our journal, American Jewish History (published quarterly).
The 2023 Wasserman Prize will be announced soon.
The 2022 Wasserman Prize winner was Britt P. Tevis for her 2021 article, “Trends in the Study of Antisemitism in United States History.”
Lee Max Friedman Award Medal
The Lee Max Friedman Award Medal was established in memory of a past AJHS president. A committee appointed by the AJHS’s Executive Committee solicits nominations to recognize an individual, group, or institution that has a longstanding record of excellence in service to the field of American Jewish history. This service may include scholarly publications and contributions, public engagement, and support for scholars and scholarship in the field. It is awarded on a biennial basis.
The Lee Max Friedman Award is presented biannually at the AJHS Biennial Scholars Conference. The next award will be presented in 2026.
