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The Jane Chambers Award

Celebrating
40 Years
in 2024!!!

"The Jane Chambers Prize for Feminist Playwriting has had an outsized impact on the field and artists lives, contributing to more astute reception, and increased production, of myriad of women and genderqueer writers for the stage."  ~Maya E. Roth

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To read the ATHE newsletter article celebrating 40 years of the Jane Chambers Award, CLICK HERE.

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THE JANE CHAMBERS AWARD recognizes new plays and performance texts created by women writers which present a feminist perspective and that provide significant opportunities for female performers. This annual award, founded in 1984, welcomes experimentations in form and in subject matter. It is given in memory of lesbian playwright Jane Chambers, who through her plays such as A Late SnowMy Blue HeavenLast Summer at Bluefish Cove, and Kudzu became a major feminist voice in American theater. Sponsored by the Women and Theatre Program with the Association for Theater in Higher Education, the contest understands feminism to cross an array of class, sex, race, national, ethnic, theatrical, and/or geographic perspectives. The Jane Chambers Contest winner receives $1000 and a rehearsed reading at ATHE’s annual summer conference, where she is recognized at ATHE's Awards Ceremony.

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Read more about Jane Chambers and her work at JaneChambers.org.

Please click here or to the right for contest information or to submit your play. The deadline for submissions is February 5, 2024.

Contact our Jane Chambers coordinators Jennifer-Scott Mobley and Maya Roth with questions.

2024 Jane Chambers Award

Jane Chambers Award for Excellence in Feminist Playwriting

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THIS YEAR'S WINNER:

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shadow/land by Erika Dickerson-Despenza

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RUNNERS UP:

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Beautiful Blessed Child by Daria Miyeko Marinelli

The Words of Ants by Xiaoyan Kang

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HONORABLE MENTIONS:

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Amma’s Wit by Sandra A. Daley-Sharif

Traces of Desire by Lina Patel

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This year we had a record number of submissions--450-- read across 4 rounds of adjudication by 36 readers across the country. Thank you to all of our readers and Congratulations and Kudos to our winner, runners up and honorable mentions!

Previous Winners

Curation Notes for Winners and Honorable Mentions can be read by clicking on the year.

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Winner: shadow/land by Erika Dickerson-Despenza

Winner: The Magician's Sister by Jami Brandli

Winner: Mama, I wish I were silver by Amanda L. Andrei

Winner: Peeling Oranges by Patty Kim Hamilton

Winner: How We Survived by Pauline David-Sax

Winner: In the Cervix of Others by Alice Eve Cohen

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Winner: Queens by Martyna Majok

Winner: Never Not Once by Carey Crim

Winner: No Candy by Emma Staunton

Winner: Roe by Lisa Loomer

Winner: Femmes by Gina Young

Winner: Full/Self by Claire Chafee

Winner: Still by Jen Silverman

Winner: Mud Offerings by Natalie Marlena Goodnow

Winner: A Live Dress by Martha Jane Kaufman

Winner: The Siegels of Montauk by Meryl Cohn

Winner: Unspeakable Acts by Mary F. Casey

Winner: Trojan Barbie: A Car-Crash Encounter with Euripides' Trojan Women by Christine Evans

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