As a result of the excellence of the following two articles, the Redekop Prize Committee has chosen David Janzen’s article “Petrocultural Formations: Crisis Discourse, Energy Geographies, and Neo-liberalism” and Ira Wells’s article “‘Don’t Pray for Me, Pray for Them!’: Norman Jewison’s In the Heat of the Night and Hollywood “Redneckification” of Anti-Black Racism,” both appearing in the 53.3 issue of CRAS, as co-winners of the 2023 Redekop Prize. Aaron Obedkoff’s article “‘If You Wish a Picture”: Ekphrasis as Technique in Solmaz Sharif’s Look,” appearing in the 53.2 issue of CRAS has been selected for honorable mention.

In “Petrocultural Formations: Crisis Discourse, Energy Geographies, and Neo-liberalism,” Janzen ably guides readers as he connects macroeconomic and geopolitical analysis to the historical event of the Levittown gas riot. The article makes an important contribution to our understanding of U.S. neoliberalism’s evolution through its engagement with both its specific historical materials and Marxist economic theory.  Furthermore, Janzen eloquently expands and elucidates the concept of “crisis,” linking questions of definition to material concerns, to history, to the present moment, thereby employing an Americanist lens through the focus on Levittown, PA while artfully and simultaneously contributing to the ongoing and ever-imperative global discussion.

Ira Wells’s article “‘Don’t Pray for Me, Pray for Them!’: Norman Jewison’s In the Heat of the Night and Hollywood “Redneckification” of Anti-Black Racism,” is cleverly constructed, beginning with a Russian stage adaptation of the film before working its way back to the film itself, its production, and its creator’s Canadian youth. Significantly, the article extends beyond the pale, refusing to settle on the common, reductive answers. There are reasons for filmic “redneckification” that make intuitive sense, Wells notes, but he also goes further, considering the limitations of a filmmaker’s autonomy as well as the links between anti-Black racism and anti-Semitism, and American and Canadian versions of racism. While the argument that regionalization of racism serves as a tool of effacement for northern racism may not be necessarily new, it is argued from an innovative and well-developed perspective. Furthermore, this article does well in its contribution to the extant body of scholarship on Jewison—in which Wells specializes.

Aaron Obedkoff’s article “‘If You Wish a Picture”: Ekphrasis as Technique in Solmaz Sharif’s Look” appearing in the 53.2 issue of CRAS receives Honorable Mention as itcoordinates a number of theoretical touchpoints to produce an original and useful framework for understanding art made within (and commenting upon) the post-9/11 “scopic regime.” Obedekoff’s engagement with theories of ekphrasis particularly novel and engaging. Well-written and well-structured, the piece dwells in the ekphrastic details of Sharif’s poetry collection, but is also unafraid to gesture at the larger concerns raised by said ekphrasis. The article is well-written and well-developed.

With thanks to the Redekop Prize Committee: Bernadette Russo, Brian Jansen, and Craig Stensrud.