Introducing our 2022 Chair of the Jury
The award-winning US environmental historian J.R. McNeill will chair the jury for the 2022 Cundill History Prize.
The professor at Georgetown University is the author, among many other titles, of the milestone Something New Under the Sun: An Environmental History of the Twentieth-Century World (2000), which argued that human activity during the 20th century led to environmental changes on an unprecedented scale, largely due to a global energy system built around fossil fuels.
J.R. McNeill said: “In 2022, public events remind us once more that history is always with us shaping our world and our lives. The need for works of history that combine the highest scholarly standards with appealing prose is as urgent as ever. The Cundill History Prize shines a spotlight on exactly that sort of book. I look forward to working with fellow jurors on our task.”
LISTEN to this dedicated winner's episode of CBC IDEAS, with Marjoleine Kars in conversation with host Nahlah Ayed and reading from her Cundill-winning Blood on the River.
READ about the moment Marjoleine Kar was announced as the Cundhill History Prize 2021 winner in the Montreal Gazette newspaper.
LISTEN to Marjoleine Kars on the History Extra podcast with Elinor Evans, discussing a little-known 1763 rebellion by enslaved people in Berbice, in present-day Guyana.
FESTIVAL REPLAY: 1
RE-WATCH the 2021 Winner Ceremony of the Cundill History Prize, hosted by CBC Ideas' Nahlah Ayed, with live interviews by History Hit's Dan Snow.
FESTIVAL REPLAY: 2
RE-WATCH the Cundill Forum, with 2021 finalists Rebecca Clifford, Marie Favereau and Marjoleine Kars in a fascinating conversation on 'Why Do We Rewrite History?'.
FESTIVAL REPLAY: 3
RE-WATCH Camilla Townsend's stand-out Cundill Lecture 'THINKING ABOUT THE AZTECS: On the Possibility of Changing our Minds', in partnership with History Extra.
READ Marjoleine Kar's article in the Globe & Mail newspaper, a long-overdue reckoning with a racist and colonial past in the Netherlands.
LISTEN to juror Henrietta Harrison in conversation with BBC Radio 3 presenter Rana Mitter about the winning Blood in the River.
READ an overview of the Cundhill History Prize 2021 in Publishing Perspectives.
The 2021 Finalists
Rebecca Clifford
Survivors: Children's Lives after the Holocaust
Yale University Press
Marie Favereau
The Horde: How the Mongols Changed the World
Belknap Press of Harvard University Press
Marjoleine Kars
Blood on the River: a Chronicle of Mutiny and Freedom on the Wild Coast
The New Press
Discover the books
RE-WATCH our 2021 Finalists Announcement event.
RE-WATCH our 2021 Shortlist Announcement event.
EXPLORE our YouTube channel.
The 2021 Jury
Michael Ignatieff (Chair)
Rector and President, Central European University
Eric Foner
DeWitt Clinton Professor Emeritus of History, Columbia University
Henrietta Harrison
Professor of Modern Chinese Studies in the Faculty of Oriental Studies, University of Oxford
Sunil Khilnani
Professor of History and Politics, Ashoka University
Jennifer L. Morgan
Professor of History in the department of Social and Cultural Analysis, New York University
