The shortlist for the £25,000 British Academy Book Prize for Global Cultural Understanding has been revealed.

The international prize, in its 10th year, rewards and celebrates the best works of non-fiction that have contributed to public understanding of world cultures. 

The shortlisted titles are:

Aftermath: Life in the Fallout of the Third Reich - Harald Jähner, cultural journalist and former editor of Berliner Zeitung, explores life in Germany after the Second World War and asks how a nation recovers from Nazism. This "fascinating" and "ground-breaking" history of Germany’s mentality in the decade after the Second World War is translated by Shaun Whiteside. 

Osebol: Voices from a Swedish Village - Marit Kapla, editor of a cultural magazine in Gothenburg, brings to life the stories of the 40 remaining residents of a remote village in Sweden. Kapla’s engrossing debut book became an unexpected phenomenon in Sweden and is translated by Peter Graves. 

When Women Kill: Four Crimes Retold - the Chilean novelist Alia Trabucco Zerán – who was shortlisted in 2019 for the Man Booker International Prize – analyses four homicides carried out by Chilean women over the course of the 20th century. The result of many years of research, this captivating work of narrative non-fiction not only examines the circumstances around the four killings but the reactions from society, the media and the men in power. It is translated by Sophie Hughes. 

The Invention of Miracles: Language, Power, and Alexander Graham Bell’s Quest to End Deafness by debut author Katie Booth, who grew up in a mixed hearing / deaf family, is the result of more than a decade’s research. This "compelling" and "revelatory" biography of Alexander Graham Bell tells the dual stories of the invention of the telephone and how Bell became the enemy of the deaf community in his efforts to stamp out sign language in America. 

Kingdom of Characters: A Tale of Language, Obsession and Genius in Modern China - Jing Tsu, a professor of East Asian languages and literatures & comparative literature at Yale, combines meticulous research with a compelling narrative to tell the stories of the bold innovators who adapted the Chinese language to make it accessible to a globalised, digital world. 

Horizons: A Global History of Science - James Poskett, associate professor in the History of Science & Technology at the University of Warwick, challenges the traditional Eurocentric narrative in a radical retelling of the history of science and celebrates scientists from Africa, America, Asia and the Pacific and the parts they played in this story. This is his first book for a general readership. 

Chair of this year’s jury, Professor Patrick Wright, fellow of the British Academy, said: “This is the 10th year of the British Academy Book Prize, which now attracts many entries from across the humanities and social sciences, and includes books by journalists and independent writers as well as academics. Themes vary greatly and each book on this year’s shortlist greatly impressed the judges, not only for casting new and often quite unexpected light on an issue of global currency and importance, but its imaginative way of combining original research with a style and approach that is accessible to the non-specialist reader.” 

The winner of the £25,000 prize will be announced at an award ceremony on Wednesday 26th October. Last year’s winner was Sujit Sivasundaram for Waves Across the South: A New History of Revolution and Empire.

The Shortlist

Aftermath: Life in the Fallout of the Third Reich by Harald Jähner

Osebol: Voices from a Swedish Village by Marit Kapla

When Women Kill: Four Crimes Retold by Alia Trabucco Zerán

The Invention of Miracles: Language, Power, and Alexander Graham Bell’s Quest to End Deafness by Katie Booth

Kingdom of Characters: A Tale of Language, Obsession and Genius in Modern China  by Jing Tsu

Horizons: A Global History of Science by James Poskett

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