The winners of the 2022 Royal Society of Literature Giles St Aubyn Awards for Nonfiction are:
£10,000 (about $12,150) to Nuzha Nuseibeh for Namesake. Judges wrote: "What is it to be a feminist, a mother, a warrior? What does bravery look like in the context of interminable conflict? By seeking to understand her namesake in the context of her own 21st century concerns, Nuseibeh connects our current ideas of Muslims and Arabs with their origins, looking at myth-making and identity, religion and nationhood, feminism and race, early Muslim history and contemporary Britain.
"As intimate as they are thoughtful, these linked essays offer a dazzling exploration of heritage, gender and the idea of home, whilst also posing the larger question of how connecting with our history can help us understand ourselves and others today."
£5,000 ($6,075) to Ellen Atlanta for Pixel Flesh: Modern Beauty Culture and the Women It Harms. Judges wrote: "Pixel Flesh is the first non-fiction book to explore Millennial and Gen-Z women's relationship to beauty, and the systems and industries that seek to commodify and control our appearance. From 'Love Island' to lip filler, mixed-fishing to the male gaze, Ellen holds digital beauty culture to account and highlights the unbelievable impact it has on women's lives. Pixel Flesh provides an exploration of digital feminism through conversation and intimate observation, and represents a refusal to brush the issues facing young women under the carpet."
£2,500 ($3,040) to Malachi McIntosh for A Revolutionary Consciousness: Black Britain, Black Power, and the Caribbean Artists Movement. Judges wrote: "A Revolutionary Consciousness tells the story of the Caribbean Artists Movement (CAM)--a vanguard organisation that united a community of novelists, poets, artists, dancers, and activists in the face of growing hostility to Caribbean emigrants in 1960s and '70s Britain. At the book's heart are CAM's three founders: the publisher and activist John La Rose; the poet and historian Edward Kamau Brathwaite; and the writer, thinker, and impresario Andrew Salkey--a trio of pioneers who, through CAM, would radically transform the perceptions of their people."
