The Alison G. Fraker '89 Essay Prize
Established in 1990 by Drue Cortell Gensler '57, Middlebury College trustee, this award honors the memory of Alison Gwen Fraker '89 (shown in a dance performance, at right), a much-beloved, vocally feminist student who was killed in a car accident a few weeks short of her graduation. The prize is awarded to a student whose essay on a topic specifically concerning women and gender studies is judged the best. It excludes senior theses.
This year, Piya Kashyap '07 won the Fraker Prize for her weblog "A Journey Back," about her winter term travels to India. Professor Barbara Ganley explained the project's outstanding merit in the following way: "Piya's weblog-based chronicle stands as an extraordinary achievement for an undergraduate student. … Piya has written a series of exquisite short essays on a range of topics concerning women in India, using her readings as well as her experiences to extend her analysis; she has effectively used an online medium to bring her writing-on-the-road experience to the world, creating a richly woven story of a young woman's search for a part of herself within the essay sequence, all within the frame of a single month as she was on the road; in turn she pushed her thinking through online discussion as she journeyed. This project is a model of good writing, incisive commentary, and effective use of technology."
The winner for 2006 was Elizabeth Lyon '06, for her essay "From Each According to Her Perceived Ability: An Experimental Study of Seller Discrimination in the Mao-orabilia Market at the New Silk Alley" on Chinese women's experiences in the Beijing marketplace. According to Associate Professor of Economics Jeffrey Carpenter, "I thought Liz's project was particularly ambitious for a Middlebury student and that the results were a nice contrast to much of the related literature I have read on gender discrimination."
The Drue Cortell Gensler '57 Prize
Established in 1990 by Drue Cortell Gensler '57,a Middlebury College trustee, this prize goes to the student with the best senior project—thesis, performance, or creative work—on a topic concerning women and gender studies.
In 2005, Stephanie Morales '05 won the Gensler Prize for her senior thesis presentation. "Four Women or 'I Guess They'd Rather I Strip for A Living': The Politics of Hairbraiding".
Gensler Prize Recipients
2004
Lila Buckley
"The Newborn Kingdom: Voices of Urban Chinese Women and the Politics of Reproduction"
2003
Margaret Aleles
2002
Laura Bloom
John Kent
2001
Amanda Cecil
Lisa Engelstein
"A Feminist Approach to Bioethics"
2000
Elizabeth Young
1999
Nicole Lanthier
Stephanie Saldana
1998
Sarah Edson
Pratima Sipahimalani
1997
Karen Francolla
1996
Gretchen Elias
1995
Carolina Clutz
Katherine Berry
Evelyn Holley
1994
Gretchen Anderson
"Sylvia Plath and the Language of Female Eroticism"
Cynthia Coe
Iffath Sharif
"Beyond Survival: The Role of Credit in Rural Women's Socio-Economic Development"
1993
Rosemarie Recchia
Jeffrey Spencer
"Teaching Old Mosques New Tricks: Modernization, Political Islam, and the 'Woman Question' in Algeria and Tunisia"
1992
Wendy Staats
Sarah Woodard
1991
Erica Sasaki
Andrea Schaefer
1990
Tracey Gallin
Jessica Lindert