Avie Bennett Prize in Canadian Literature
A prize of $650 plus a selection of books from The New Canadian Library is awarded annually for the best essay written by an undergraduate student registered in a Canadian Literature course at the Constituent University. Every year instructors of Canadian literature courses will be invited to recommend the best essay submitted for credit within the current academic year.
Warmest congratulations to Cassidy Gregorio (Faculty of Arts and Humanities), recipient of the 2025 Avie Bennett Prize in Canadian Literature for their essay, “Personified Resistance: The Natural Subversion of Colonial Heroism in ‘Malcolm’s Katie’,” written for English 2501E: Canadian Literature Survey, taught by Professor Manina Jones.
The adjudicator for this year’s award, Professor David Bentley, shared the following remarks: “Engagingly written and brimming with insights and au courant ideas, Personified Resistance: The Natural Subversion of Colonial Heroism in ‘Malcolm’s Katie’ has been a pleasure to read and ponder.”
Special thanks to Professor David Bentley for adjudicating the award this year.
Contest Rules
- Entries for Fall/Winter 2024-25 must be submitted by the instructor by Friday, April 18, 2025.
- Students must be registered on Main campus.
- Submissions cannot be hitherto published or won an award in any other competition.
- Eligible essays should receive a mark of at least 85%.
- Entries must be submitted from the instructor by email to uenglish@uwo.ca with the mark and instructor’s comments included.
- The winner will be notified by email by the end of May 2025.
- The results will be posted on the Department of English and Writing Studies website and social media channels.
Inquiries
PREVIOUS RECIPIENTS
| Year | Recipient | Title | Course | Adjudicator(s) |
| 2024 | Annika Thornton | "Roots and the Rhizome: Conceptualizing Multicultural Identity in Fred Wah’s Diamond Grill" | English 3572F | Professor Manina Jones |
| 2023 | Samantha Ellis | "Eligibly Legible: The Language Apparatus and (Un)Becoming a Canadian Subject in Sharon Bala’s The Boat People" | English 3571G | Professor Pauline Wakeham |
| 2022 | Kye Handleman | "Then is now. Now is then": Reclaiming Marie-Joseph Angélique" | English 3579F | Professor Pauline Wakeham |
| 2021 | Liam Waterman | "Perpetuating Exclusion: Chinese Canadian Masculinity in Fred Wah’s Diamond Grill" | English 3572G | Professor Manina Jones |
| 2020 | Alanna Zorgdrager | "How Historical Metafiction Approaches Loss in Obasan and ‘Meneseteung’" | English 2501E | Professor Julia Emberley |
| 2019 | Meher Hakim | "The Japanese-Canadian Experience: Dehumanization, Rape, and Blame in Joy Kowaga’s Obasan" | English 2501E | Professors Pauline Wakeham and Richard Moll |
| 2018 | Roshana Ghaedi | "Trauma, Photography, and Fragmentation in Timothy Findley’s The Wars" | English 2501E | Professors Manina Jones and David Bentley |
| 2017 | Jennifer Tombs | "How the Symbol of the B'gwus Functions as a Way of Speaking Back to Colonial Narratives in Monkey Beach" | English 3880G | Professors Manina Jones and Donna Pennee |
| 2016 | Mitchell Horkoff | "The Static City and the City in Flux: Navigating Cultural Identity Through Urbanity in Barometer" | English 2309E | Professor Richard Moll |
| 2015 | Emma Lammers | "A Marriage of Documentary and Myth: Regionality in James Reaney's Sticks and Stones" | English 3776G | Professors Donna Pennee and Pauline Wakeham |
| 2014 | Elizabeth DiEmanuele | "The Repugnant Subject: Contradiction in the Indian Act of 1876" | English 3880G | |
| 2013 | Erin Lamotte | "Ambivalence Towards Postmodernism in the Employment of Historiographic Metafiction in Alice Munro's "Menesteung" and Timothy Findley's The Wars" | English 2309E | |
| 2012 | Nicole Askin | "Multifaceted Millions: National Identity in Shane Koyczan's 'We Are More'" | English 3774E | |
| 2011 | Emily Kring | "Deconstructing Two-Spiritedness: Kent Monkham, Miss Chief, and Binary Blending" | English 4720G | |
| 2010 | Paige-Tiffany Beck | "Somewhere Between Blue-Face and Banditos: The Theatrical 'Borderlands' in The Adventures of Ali & Ali and the aXes of Evil and Fronteras Americanas" | English 2470G | |
| 2009 | Matthew Waddell | "Me, Myself, and I: Questioning Empathy" | English 2470G | |
| 2008 | Lisa Madokoro | "Mapping Home: Questioning Space and Place in Princess Pocahontas and The Unnatural And Accidental Women" | English 474F | |
| 2007 | Tara McDonald | "Wacousta's Winsome Women: The Portrayal of European and Native Femininity in the Canadian Council Project" | English 274E | |
| 2006 | David Barrick | "thingness with capitalism (post theoretical politics as decribed in by Nichol" | English 160E | |
| 2005 | Colleen Daniher | "The Canadian Musical: Producing a Soundscape of Identity" | English 287G | |
| 2004 | Jordan Berard | "Finding the 'Voice to Utter Such Catastrophe': Revolution in Canadian Holocaust Poetry" | English 274E | |
| 2003 | Elizabeth Bohnert | "Coyote in Drag: Gender Difference and Appropriation of Native Mythology" | English 274E | |
| 2002 | Danielle Picard | "'A Double Wound': Social Injustice and Bodily Harm in Joy Kogawa's Obasan" | English 160E |
