The SAfA Book Prize is open to books and monographs, including site reports, in all fields of African archaeology, including ethnoarchaeology and the African diaspora, from the beginnings of the archaeological record to the present. Single author, multi-author and edited works are all eligible. There is no restriction as to language.

For the 2023 SAfA Book Prize, only books published in 2020 and afterwards are eligible for the prize.

To be considered, a book must be in print and should have been published between 2020 and 2023. Books considered for the 2021 competition cannot be resubmitted in this round.

Closing date for submissions for the 2023 SAfA Book Prize is 15 April 2023

To put forward a book for consideration in 2023, please arrange for a copy to be sent to each of the judges.

Professor Anne Haour

Sainsbury Research Unit

Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts

University of East Anglia

Norwich NR4 7TJ

United Kingdom

Professor Gérard Chouin
William & Mary
Department of History
James Blair, Room 330

250 James Blair Dr.

Williamsburg, VA 23185

USA

The SAfA Book Prize is awarded every two years at the SAfA Biennial Meeting to a book which makes an exceptional contribution within one of the following areas, or to a significant contribution in a number of them:

1) an important theoretical advance in African archaeology;

2) an important methodological advance in African archaeology;

3) a major advance in our knowledge of the African past;

4) success in taking African archaeology to a world audience;

5) success in breaking down disciplinary division in African archaeology, be they temporal, geographic, linguistic, or other;

6) success in championing the value of African archaeology within an African nation or community;

7) success in championing the protection and preservation of Africa's archaeological heritage.

Previous winners:

2021:

Monograph:

Sada, Mire, Divine Fertility The Continuity in Transformation of an Ideology of Sacred Kinship in Northeast Africa. Routledge, 2020

Edited Volume: Specific

Stephanie Wynne-Jones and Adria LaViolette (eds.), The Swahili World. Routledge, 2020

Edited Volume: Pan-Africa

Geoffroy Heimlich (editorial coordination), Art rupestre et patrimoine mondial en Afrique subsaharienne. Hemispheres, 2021.

2018:

Cameron Gokee, Assembling the Village in Medieval Bambuk: An Archaeology of Interaction at Biouboye.  Equinox Publishing, 2016. 

2016:

Alfredo González-Ruibal, An Archaeology of Resistance: Materiality and Time in an African Borderland. Rowman & Littlefield, 2014. 

2014:

Peter Mitchell, Paul Lane (eds.), Oxford Handbook of African Archaeology. Oxford University Press, 2013. 

2012:

Anne Mayor, Traditios céramiques dans la boucle du Niger. Ethnoarchéologie et histoire du peuplement au temps des empires précoloniaux. Africa Magna Verlag, 2011. 

2010:

Phillipe Lavachery, Scott MacEachern, Tchago Bouimon, Christophe Mbida Mindzie, De Komé à Kribi: Archéologie préventive le long de l'oléoduc Tchad-Cameroun, 1999- 2004. Africa Magna Verlag, 2010. 

2008:

Peter R. Schmidt, Matthew C. Curtis, Zelalem Haile Teka (eds.), The Archaeology of Ancient Eritrea. Red Sea Press, 2008. 

2006:   

Ann Brower Stahl (ed.), African Archaeology: A Critical Introduction. Blackwell, 2005.