George Ryga Award for Social Awareness in Literature

The George Ryga Award for Social Awareness in Literature is a literary award given to a British Columbian author "who has achieved an outstanding degree of social awareness in a new book published in the preceding calendar year."[1] The prize was created in 2004 by Allan Twigg of BC Book World along with John Lent of Okanagan College[2] and Ken Smedley, then working for the George Ryga Centre Society.[3] In 2014 Alan Twigg took over responsibility for the award after the sale of Ryga House. Originally the prize included a sculpture/plaque by sculptor, Reg Kienast, entitled The Censor's Golden Rope. Now it includes a cash award of $2,500.

Nominees and winners
Year Winner Finalists
2004
Judge: Craig McLuckie		 Maggie De Vries, Missing Sarah: A Vancouver Woman Remembers Her Vanished Sister
  • Marie Clements, Burning Vision
  • Matt Hern, Field Day: Getting Society Out of School
  • Patricia E. Roy, The Oriental Question: Consolidating a White Man's Province, 1914-41
2005
Judge: Ross Tyner		 Robert Hunter, The Greenpeace to Amchitka: An Environmental Odyssey
  • Stephen Hume and Alexandra Morton, A Stain Upon the Sea: West Coast Salmon Farming
  • Roy Miki, Redress: Inside the Japanese Canadian Call for Justice
2006
Judge: Myrna Kotash		 Leslie A. Robertson and Dara Culhane, In Plain Sight: Reflections on Life in Downtown Eastside Vancouver
  • Jean Barman, Stanley Park's Secret: The Forgotten Families of Whoi Whoi, Kanaka Ranch, and Brockton Point
  • Michael Kluckner, Vanishing British Columbia
2007
Judge: Sharon Josephson		 Harold Rhenisch, The Wolves at Evelyn: Journeys Through a Dark Century
  • Daniel Francis, Red Light Neon: A History of Vancouver's Sex Trade
  • Lynne Van Luven, Nobody's Mother: Life Without Kids
2008
Judge: Ivan Townshend		 Leilah Nadir, The Orange Trees of Baghdad: In Search of My Lost Family
  • Gary Geddes, Falsework
  • Ernest Hekkanen, Of a Fire Beyond the Hills
2009
Judge: Ivan Townshend		 Steven Galloway, The Cellist of Sarajevo
  • Brian Dedora, A Slice of Voice at the Edge of Hearing
  • JoAnn Dionne, Little Emperors: A Year with the Future of China
  • Manjit Virk, Reena: A Father's Story
2010
Judge: Greg Simison		 Larry Campbell, Neil Boyd and Lori Culbert, A Thousand Dreams: Vancouver's Downtown Eastside and the Fight for Its Future
2011
Judge: Andrew Steeves		 Richard Wagamese, One Story, One Song
  • Gabor Gasztonyi, A Room in the City: Photographs of Gabor Gasztonyi
  • Sylvia Olsen, Working with Wool: A Coast Salish Legacy and the Cowichan Sweater
  • Benjamin Perrin, Invisible Chains: Canada's Underground World of Human Trafficking
  • John Vaillant, The Tiger: A True Story of Vengeance and Survival
2012 No award presented
2013
Judge: Angie Abdou		 Joel Bakan, Childhood Under Siege: How Big Business Targets Children
  • Michael Christie, The Beggar’s Garden
  • Howard White, A Hard Man to Beat: The Story of Bill White, Labour Leader, Historian, Shipyard Worker, Raconteur
2014
Judge: Sean Johnston		 Bev Sellars, They Called Me Number One: Secrets and Survival at an Indian Residential School
  • Adrienne Fitzpatrick, The Earth Remembers Everything
  • Gillian Wigmore, Dirt of Ages
2015
Jury: George Brandak, Anne Chudyk, Beverly Cramp		 Shelley Wright, Our Ice is Vanishing / Sikuvat Nunguliqtuq: A History of Inuit, Newcomers, and Climate Change
  • Michael Buckley, Meltdown in Tibet: China’s Reckless Destruction of Ecosystems from the Highlands of Tibet to the Deltas of Asia
  • Ann Rogers and John Hill, Unmanned: Drone Warfare and Global Security
2016
Jury: Trevor Carolan, Jane Curry, George Johnson		 Andrew MacLeod, A Better Place on Earth: The Search for Fairness in Super Unequal British Columbia''
  • David R. Boyd, The Optimistic Environmentalist: Progressing Toward a Greener Future
  • Larry Gambone, No Regrets
  • Chris and Josh Hergesheimer, The Flour Peddlar
  • Carrie Saxifrage, The Big Swim: Coming Ashore in a World Adrift
  • David Suzuki, Letters to My Grandchildren
2017
Jury: Trevor Carolan, Jane Curry, Beverley Cramp		 Wade Davis, Wade Davis: Photographs
  • Stephen Collis, Once in Blockadia
  • Ivan Coyote, Tomboy Survival Guide
  • Marc Edge, The News We Deserve: The Transformation of Canada’s Media Landscape
  • James Hoggan with Grania Litwin, I’m Right and You’re an Idiot: The Toxic State of Public Discourse and How to Clean It Up
  • Eric Jamieson, The Native Voice: The Story of How Maisie Hurley and Canada’s First Aboriginal Newspaper Changed a Nation
  • Alan Livingstone MacLeod, Remembered in Bronze and Stone: Canada’s Great War Memorial Statuary
  • Christopher Pollon and Ben Nelms, The Peace in Peril: The Real Cost of the Site C Dam
  • Anton Scamvougeras, Dysconnected: Humans Isolated by their Personal Technology
  • Ron Smith, The Defiant Mind: Living Inside a Stroke
2019
Jury: Jane Curry, Trevor Carolan, and Beverly Cramp		 Travis Lupick, Fighting for Space: How a Group of Drug Users Transformed One City’s Struggle with Addiction''
  • Gary Geddes, Medicine Unbundled: A Journey through the Minefields of Indigenous Health Care
  • David Suzuki and Ian Hanington, Just Cool It! The Climate Crisis and What We Can Do

References
  1. The George Ryga Award
  2. Ryga, George. "George Ryga Award Overview". BC Book Awards. BC Book Awards. Retrieved 8 June 2020.
  3. Ware, Grahame. "George Ryga Award: The Okanagan Years".
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