Award:
Claire Sponsler Award
Award Year:
2024
Winner: Renberg, Lynneth Miller (she/her). Women, Dance and Parish Religion in England, 1300-1640: Negotiating the Steps of Faith. Boydell & Brewer, 2022.
The first prize-winner for this new prize for a first book, dedicated to our late and beloved colleague Claire Sponsler, goes to Lynneth Miller Renberg for Women, Dance and Parish Religion in England, 1300-1640: Negotiating the Steps of Faith, published by Boydell & Brewer in 2022. The committee found this book eye-opening, engaging, field-changing, and deeply researched. We were absolutely fascinated by Renberg’s scholarship and dazzled by her depth of research. We believe that this book will become an indispensable teaching tool for anybody working on dance in our field.
Honorable Mentions:
- Di Salvo, Gina M. (she/her). The Renaissance of the Saints After Reform. Oxford University Press, 2023.
- Van Leuveren, Bram (he/they). Early Modern Diplomacy and French Festival Culture in a European Context, 1572-1615. Brill, 2023.
The committee would like to give two honorable mentions this year to Gina Di Salvo for The Renaissance of the Saints After Reform published by Oxford University Press in 2023, and to Bram Van Leuveren for Early Modern Diplomacy and French Festival Culture in a European Context, 1572-1615, published by Brill in 2023. We were so impressed by the excellence of these two new monographs, and particularly by the engaging and page-turning charisma achieved by Di Salvo and by the breathtaking research and breadth of interdisciplinary expertise accomplished by Van Leuveren.
Committee: Mark Chambers, Mario Longtin, and E. Maggie Solberg (chair). Awards announcement and presentation took place during the annual MRDS business meeting in May 2024, at the 59th International Congress on Medieval Studies, Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo, Michigan.