Finalists for the Ramirez Family Award of the Texas Institute of Letters

Allie Tennant and the Visual Arts in Dallas has been named as a finalist for the 2016 Ramirez Family Award presented each year by the Texas Institute of Letters. This award recognizes the best scholarly book published during the previous calendar year, in this case 2015. The three books named as finalists must meet at least one of two criteria: the volume must have content centered on some aspect of Texas or it must have been written by someone who has lived in Texas for at least two years. This award is endowed by Renato Ramirez. Mr. Ramirez and his family support this award as part of their continuing commitment to Texas letters. Mr. Ramirez himself is a master of the lively art of la declamación, the Spanish language oral poetry tradition of the Texas/Mexico border region.

The other two books named as the finalists for this award are Seeds of Empire: Cotton, Slavery, and the Transformation of the Texas Borderlands, 1800-1850 by Andrew Torget. It was published by the University of North Carolina Press. Dr. Torget is a faculty member in the history department at the University of North Texas. The other finalist is Competing Visions of Empire: Labor, Slavery, and the Origins of the British Atlantic Empires by Abigail Swingen. She is a member of the history department faculty at Texas Tech University. It was published by the Yale University Press. 

The award will be presented to one of the finalists during the Texas Institute of Letters spring banquet that will be held in Austin at the Bullock State History Museum on the evening of April 16.

To learn more about the books that share TIL finalist status with the Allie Tennant volume, please click below.

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