4 February 2022
PRESS RELEASE
The CAMWS (camws.org) Subcommittee for the Ladislaus J. Bolchazy Pedagogy Book Award announces the award winner for 2022: Mia Donato, Carolyn Engargiola, Eli Gendreau-Distler, Elizabeth Hasapis, Thomas G. Hendrickson, Jacob Nguyen, Siddharth Pant, Shamika Podila, Anna Riordan, Oliver Thompson, The Passion of Perpetua: A Latin Text of the Passio Sanctarum Perpetuae et Felicitatis with Running Vocabulary and Commentary (Pixelia Publishing, 2021).
The Classical Association of the Middle West and South is pleased to announce the winner of this year’s Ladislaus J. Bolchazy Pedagogy Book Award. The criteria for this award include appropriateness for the target audience; clarity of presentation; excellent quality of both the selections and the commentary; clear, and clearly met, pedagogical aims and effective design; and potential for broad impact. We place particular emphasis on books that support the study of the Greek and/or Latin languages. This year’s winner is Mia Donato, Carolyn Engargiola, Eli Gendreau-Distler, Elizabeth Hasapis, Thomas G. Hendrickson, Jacob Nguyen, Siddharth Pant, Shamika Podila, Anna Riordan, Oliver Thompson, The Passion of Perpetua: A Latin Text of the Passio Sanctarum Perpetuae et Felicitatis with Running Vocabulary and Commentary (Pixelia Publishing, 2021).
Subcommittee members praised many aspects of the book as a “clear and concise beginner's commentary of an understudied ancient author whose straightforward style is ideal for beginning and intermediate Latin students.” Other laudatory comments note the book’s range of impact observing that “no prior edition of Perpetua's passion is designed for students like this one has been. It is priced right (under $10), and it has a text similar to Pharr's Aeneid—approachable and readable by advanced Latin students.” On the clarity of presentation one member wrote: “This commentary includes a clear and accessible introduction, which provides the reader with a solid grounding in the debates about the text without strongly taking a side … and draws the reader in to why the text remains compelling, primarily through its explication of the various identities of Perpetua and the complex history of the Roman Empire in the 3rd century.”
The committee agrees that this text, vocabulary, and commentary on the Passio “offers (for students of Latin) a rare, first-person depiction of a woman's perspective within the ancient Roman world” and “has the potential to engage language classrooms in current conversations in classics and the world about gender, race, and authority.”
The award, honoring a leading figure in the development and production of textbooks for teachers and students of Classics, Ladislaus J. Bolchazy, is usually presented annually at the meeting of the Classical Association of the Middle West and South. We hope that this year the award can be made in person!
Subcommittee Members are delighted to make this award on behalf of CAMWS.
Cynthia White, The University of Arizona (chair)
Mary Hamil Gilbert, Birmingham Southern College
Teresa Ramsby, University of Masschusetts Amherst
Clifford Robinson, University of the Sciences
Sydnor Roy, Texas Tech University
Timothy Winters, Austin Peay State University