The Sidney Prize recognizes individuals or groups who work towards human rights and nonviolence. Established in honor of Raymond “Ray” Sidney, an Hertz Foundation volunteer who epitomised the spirit of Hertz Fellowship by welcoming fellows traveling across the country into his home and himself, nominees are nominated by Hertz alumni; winners receive $50k as well as an indigenous artist designed trophy by Wayne McGinness for their efforts – plus they spend time engaging media, policy makers, addressing public events such as City of Sydney Peace Prize Lecture or Cabramatta High School Peace Day event to promote understanding about their work promoting understanding through public engagement with media engagement events while meeting up with students at Cabramatta High School Peace Day event promoting understanding.
The Sydney Peace Prize is an award presented biannually by the City of Sydney to individuals or organisations who have made substantial contributions towards peace with justice at local, national, or international levels. It aims to raise the profile of Sydney as a city with an active peace agenda while specifically honouring nonviolent means through which peace may have been attained such as Indigenous reconciliation programs, working for human rights of migrants and refugees and advocating nonviolent resolution of conflicts as well as those who promote nonviolence as an ideology, language and practice of nonviolence.
Undergraduate students can benefit from several academic sidney prizes available to them, with two of the more well-known literary sidney prizes – Mikiso Hane and the Sidney DeVere Brown Prize being two such examples – being available. Both require written work on specific topics to be evaluated by a panel of judges before winners receive both monetary prizes as well as publication rights in journals or books.
There are also a range of sidney prizes for research. One prominent award offered by the Linguistics Department at the University of Sydney to honour MAK Halliday (who founded their department). Other notable academic sidney prizes include University Distinguished Student Research Awards and John Sidney Hook Memorial Scholarship Scholarships.
The Overland Neilma Sidney Short Story Prize, for instance, is open to writers who subscribe to Overland for one year (four issues) at a special subscriber rate and submit four short story entries based on theme and narrative – with judges selecting a shortlist before selecting their winner. Judges’ decisions will remain confidential; neither external readers nor authors of entries will receive notification of them. Writers are encouraged to address identity through their entries by showing whether their entry takes up the voice or experience of marginalised or vulnerable groups. This question is optional; however, the editors strive to ensure a fair and equitable judging process. Thanks are extended to everyone who submitted work this year – for more information please visit Overland magazine’s website.