GLC@Lunch: “The Symbolic Capital of Racial Literacy: Colson Whitehead’s The Nickel Boys as Pulitzer Prize Winner”
Wednesday, February 25, 2026, 12:30—1:45pm | Hybrid
In person at Yale University, Rosenkranz Hall, Room 241, 115 Prospect Street, New Haven
Online via zoom
Note: In-person seating is limited and available on a first-come, first-served basis.
Lisa Seuberth (GLC-Bavarian American-Academy Fellow; Doctoral Candidate, FAU Erlangen-Nürnberg)
The twenty-first century has seen a notable increase in the number of Black authors and racially literate novels that have been recognized by major literary awards. Between 2000 and 2020, the ability to understand and critically engage with the racialized structures of U.S. society gained prominence as a form of cultural capital within the literary public sphere. However, this shift exists in tension with the persistent racial stratification of the literary field, including the racially coded practices of literary awards. Examining Colson Whitehead’s The Nickel Boys (2019) as the winner of the 2020 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, this talk illustrates how the growing public valuation of racial literacy and diversity is simultaneously enabled and restricted by a racially stratified literary field.