Henriette Walter Graduate Student Essay Prize

In honour of Professor Henriette Walter, a prize has been established by AFLS for the best essay submitted on any topic in French linguistics. The prize is open to all currently registered graduate students, and to graduate students who have received their Masters, PhD or equivalent qualification within the past two years. Applications from non-members are welcome. The essay must be an original piece of work, in that it has not been previously published and it not currently under consideration online or by a journal. It may be part of an unfinished dissertation.

Prize: £300 and two-year AFLS membership.

Authors: co-authors are permissible. If students are from a country or institution where dissertation directors must appear as co-authors, student authors will certify being the sole authors of their respective articles.

Note: Co-authors would share the £300 prize; each co-author will be awarded two-year AFLS membership.

Format

  • Length: not exceeding 5000 words (plus references) + 150-200 word abstracts
  • Languages: French, English
  • Anonymized submission in both a Word document and a PDF
  • Please follow the JFLS style notes for the text and the bibliography.
  • Essays must include:
    • A separate title page with the name, affiliation and email address of the author(s)
    • A 150-200 word abstract in French and in English
    • The text of the article
    • Tables and figures must be inserted within the body of the text
    • Word count to be added at the end of the document

Evaluation criteria

  • The topic must be relevant to French linguistics
  • The essay tackles an original topic or a standing research question
  • The essay makes an interesting and original contribution in its area of study
  • The theoretical framework is clearly defined and relevant to the topic
  • The methodology of an experimental study is relevant to the research questions and hypotheses
  • The title is informative and representative of the topics covered in the article
  • The abstract is concise and clear
  • The essay is well written without grammatical, vocabulary or punctuation errors
  • The esay is well organized and reads well
  • References are current and relevant, and the essay shows that the works cited were read

 

The evaluation committee will be composed of members of the AFLS research committee members based on their respective areas of expertise.

Annual deadlines:

October 15th: article submission (emmanuelle.labeauATuantwerpen.be)
October 15th-January 15th: review process
January 30th: award announcement

For the year 2025, the Henriette Walter Prize was awarded to two winners: they will each receive a two-year membership in the AFLS and a cash prize of 150 pounds.

  • Brewster Chloe (then Oxford University, now University of Nottingham) Alsatian French: Negotiating the Standard and Regional Identity
  • Idowu Deborah (Ohio State University) Beyond Pattern-Specific Learning: Transfer Effects of Morphological Suffix Instruction in L2 French.

Thanks to members of the AFLS research committee for their in-depth reading and constructive feedback !

Those excellent submissions illustrate the depth and breadth of the AFLS interests. We are delighted to see an increased number of quality submissions for this second edition and we encourage AFLS members to.advertise this yearly opportunity to their students.