The sidney prize is a monthly award for outstanding journalism that exposes social injustices. Nominated articles must have appeared in a magazine, newspaper or online site the previous month. The winner is chosen by a panel of judges. The winner receives a $500 honorarium and a certificate designed by New Yorker cartoonist Edward Sorel. Nominations can be for one’s own work or someone else’s. The prize is named for philosopher and Phi Beta Kappa member Sidney Hook, who valued national distinction in scholarship, undergraduate teaching and leadership in the cause of liberal arts education.
The 2023 Neilma Sidney Short Story Prize was won by Annie Zhang for her story ‘Who Rattles the Night?’. The shortlist also included ‘A Map of Underneath’ by Madeleine Rebbechi and ‘Whack-a-Mole’ by Sheila Ngoc Pham. The winners will be published in Overland’s autumn 2024 issue, and the runners-up will be featured on our website. The competition was supported by the Malcolm Robertson Foundation and the Sydney Morning Herald. Overland is a nonprofit literary journal that publishes nonfiction, poetry, short stories and essays in service of the common good. The magazine is located on unceded Wangal land in western Sydney, Australia. To support our mission, please subscribe here.
In the 2025 U.S Hillman Prizes, judges were impressed by the depth of research and attention to detail in these two pieces:
“Rediscovering Central Asia” by S. Frederick Starr in The Wilson Quarterly
This piece takes readers on a journey into the mountains that surround Afghanistan. It recounts a time when the region was an intellectual center, home to civilizations that invented trigonometry and crystallization, estimated the Earth’s diameter with astonishing accuracy, and anticipated Darwin’s theory of evolution. It also explores the long decline of that region — including the Sunni-Shiite war that contributed to it — and modern glimmers of revival.