The SHERA Emerging Scholar Prize was awarded to Christina E. Crawford (Emory University) for her article “From Tractors to Territory: Socialist Urbanization through Standardization,” Journal of Urban History (January 2018).

The jury consisted of Carolyn C. Guile, Janet Kennedy, Juliet Koss, Marie Alice L’Heureux, and Colleen McQuillen.

Jury commendation: Rigorously researched and theoretically astute, Christina Crawford’s essay “From Tractors to Territory: Socialist Urbanization through Standardization” (Journal of Urban History) is the Award Committee’s unanimous choice for the First Annual SHERA Emerging Scholars’ Essay Prize. Examining the design and construction of both the Kharkiv Tractor Factory (1930-31) and the neighboring planned city for its workers, Crawford details the importation of a Fordist model of industrial standardization into a Soviet context and demonstrates how the concept of priviazka, taken from contemporaneous architectural discourse, was productively applied to other spheres in order to facilitate rapid growth in manufacturing and distribution. Her essay illuminates the importance of adaptability within the ostensibly standardized design practices that fueled the breakneck tempo of industrialization and urbanization during Stalin’s first Five-Year Plan. Innovative and authoritative, Crawford’s scholarship offers a methodological model for considering the relationship of architectural design and economic development during the process of early Soviet industrialization.

Next Emerging Scholar Prize deadline: September 30, 2018