We are delighted to announce that Berkeley English undergraduate major Emily Shanmugam has won first place in the Undergraduate Division of the 2025 Jane Austen Society of North America Essay Contest. You can read the essay  and we offer our congratulations to Shanmugam on this achievement!
JASNA's topic this year for the 2025 Esssay Contest was , and as they note "Students were asked to choose something Austen has used in her novels—a particular word, a recurring situation or motif, perhaps a physical object, symbol or activity—and then choose two scenes (from either the same novel or different ones) where she employs the chosen “something” in contrasting or complementary ways. The essays needed to describe the different roles the "something" plays and why Austen uses it as she does. What point is she trying to make? Does she succeed? What prompted its choice?"Â