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Honors and Awards

At the end of the academic year, outstanding anthropology majors are selected for awards in various categories.

  • The Irwin Press Paper Award in Medical Anthropology: Given to students who have produced a quality paper outlining research in medical anthropology. 
  • The Father Patrick Gaffney Integrative Anthropology Paper Award: Given to a student who has written a paper that crosses traditional boundaries and draws from a range of different areas of scholarship in an effort to develop a fuller, even if sometimes messier, understanding of being and becoming human. 
  • James McKenna and Joanne Mack Promising Anthropology Major Award: Awarded to a first and second year student with outstanding early performance in the major.
  • The Julian Samora Award: Awarded to the student who has demonstrated broad engagement with academic life.
  • The Carolyn Nordstrom Professional Achievement Award: Awarded to the student with outstanding performance in academic publication, presentation at professional meetings, grants, and fellowships.
  • Lambda Alpha Honors Society: Lambda Alpha is the national honors society for anthropologists. Notre Dame became the Beta Chapter of Indiana in 1981. Its purposes are to promote interest in the study of anthropology, to recognize outstanding student performance, and to encourage scholarship and research in anthropology.  Membership and Fees.

2026 Honors and Award Winners

  • The Irwin Press Paper Award in Medical Anthropology: Kat Lauinger, for her paper, “Understanding Patient-Physician Communication and Clinical Decision-Making Processes in Contexts of Uncertainty in Oncology”.
  • The Father Patrick Gaffney Integrative Anthropology Paper Award: 

    Kaden Cunningham for his paper “Root and Ridge: Kinship, Memory, and the Landscape of West Virginia".

  • James McKenna and Joanne Mack Promising Anthropology Major Award:
    Madeleine Fraser and Erin Kong.
  • The Julian Samora Award: Carley Sapp
  • The Carolyn Nordstrom Professional Achievement Award: Noel Shabu
  • Anthropology Honor Society of Lambda Alpha, Beta Chapter of Indiana: 

    Rebecca Dosch, Paul Falcione, Melaina Gradl, Jillian Hinck, Juliette Ingram, Katherine Kirwan, Katherine Lauinger, Lulama Moyo, Abigail O'Connor, Peyton Shrader, Katharine Steffes, Emma Walson

Past award winners