Daniel Matthews wins the Penny Pether Prize

We're delighted to announce that Daniel Matthews has been awarded the Penny Pether Prize for his book Earthbound: The Aesthetics of Sovereignty in the Anthropocene.

The prize, awarded by the Law, Literature and Humanities Association of Australasia, recognises authors whose work has made a significant contribution to the field of Australasian law, literature and humanities scholarship.

Find out more about the Penny Pether Prize here.

Order your copy of Earthbound: The Aesthetics of Sovereignty in the Anthropocene.

Congratulations Daniel – a truly deserved win!

Read the statement from the Prize committee here and below: 

"Earthbound presents a bold, original argument about the need to rethink the key coordinates of legal and political theory in light of the challenges of the Anthropocene. Daniel Matthews deftly reveals how the representational and sensory dimensions of sovereignty limit our ability to register and conceptualize those challenges, arguing that notions such as territory, people, and globalism all need to be reworked within the frame of an unfolding climate emergency. The grammar of sovereignty, the book further argues, is challenged by the language of obligation, dependence and need. Rather than adhering to any single tradition, theory, or method, the book’s ‘transdisciplinary’ approach draws on an impressive range of scholarship including spatial theory, earth sciences, and ecology, making a compelling case for law and humanities scholars facing the crisis of the twenty-first century to embark on new intellectual terrain. Incisively argued but always accessible, Matthews’ work proposes nothing less than a reformulation of the hallmarks of modernity amidst the revelation that humanity is earthbound."