The PROSE Awards

The PROSE Awards annually recognize the very best in professional and scholarly publishing by bringing attention to distinguished books, journals, and electronic content in over 40 categories. Judged by peer publishers, librarians, and medical professionals since 1976, the PROSE Awards are extraordinary for their breadth and depth.

Each year, publishers and authors are recognized at the PSP Annual Conference in Washington, D.C., for their commitment to pioneering works of research and for contributing to the conception, production, and design of landmark works in their fields. The R. R. Hawkins Award, presented to the most outstanding work among the publications selected, has been given to more than 30 works since its inception. Indeed, winners represent a broad range of disciplines: they have included Three Thousand Years of Chinese Painting (Yale University Press), Atlas of Clinical Gross Anatomy (Elsevier), The Dream of the Poem (Princeton University Press) and The Race Between Education and Technology (Harvard University Press).

The 2009 R.R. Hawkins Award was presented to two publishers: The University of Chicago Press for Plato's Philosophers: The Coherence of the Dialogues and John Wiley & Sons for Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews (WIREs). The Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews (WIREs) win marked the first time in the 34-year history of the Awards that the Hawkins prize was presented to an eProduct. The Hawkins was presented at a special Awards Luncheon on February 4, 2010 by Daniel Hawkins, son of Reginald Robert Hawkins, the former head of the Science and Technology Division of the New York Public Library and Award namesake.

The 2010 Awards planning committee has undertaken a number of changes to strengthen the level of participation among member publishers and the representation of published projects, especially journals and electronic publications. In addition to presenting a total of 50 awards, more than ever before, the 2010 PROSE program is expanding its book subject and journals categories to include electronic publications, for a more media-agnostic program that reflects the movement of our industry.