South Africa’s Humanities and Social Sciences Awards 2021 winners announced.

The winners of the Humanities and Social Sciences Awards 2021 were announced in a ceremony in Johannesburg, South Africa on March 31, 2021.

The Humanities and Social Sciences Awards, now in their sixth year, are co-ordinated by The National Institute for the Humanities and Social Sciences and open to South African publishers, scholars based in South African universities and independent artists linked to universities. The awards honour ‘outstanding, innovative and socially responsive scholarship, creative as well as digital contributions that enhance and advance fields in the humanities and social sciences’ and ‘recognise and celebrate those members of the Humanities and Social Sciences community who are undertaking the necessary work of creating post-apartheid and postcolonial forms of scholarship, creative production, and digital humanities outputs’.

The winners of this year’s awards, from the 82 submissions, were revealed at an awards ceremony at The Cradle of Humankind at Maropeng on Wednesday night. They are;

Best Fiction Single Authored Volume

• Joint winners: Scatterlings by Reŝoketŝwe Manenzhe Reggie and Me by James Hendry

Best Fiction Edited Volume

• Joburg Noir, edited by Niq Mhlongo

Poetry Award

• All the Places by Musawenkosi Khanyile

Best Non-Fiction Edited Volume

• Joint winners: Sol Plaatje’s Mhudi: History, Criticism, Celebration, edited by Sabata-mpho Mokae and Brian Willan; Our Words, Our Worlds: Writing on Black South African Women Poets, edited by Makhosazana Xaba.

Best Non-Fiction Biography

• Khamr: The Makings of a Waterslams by Jamil F Khan

Best Non-Fiction Single Authored Monograph

• Wentworth: The Beautiful Game and the Making of Place by Ashwin Desai

Creative Collections: Public Performance Art

• Virtual JOMBA! Festival (Ismail Mahomed)

Creative Collections: Visual Art

• Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum: There are Mechanisms in Place (Nkule Mabaso and Nomusa Makhubu)

Digital Humanities Visualisation or Infographic

• Insta-dog: Computing Instagram’s Companion Species (Karli Brittz)