Saunt named finalist for National Book Award

***Update***  Saunt named a finalist on Oct. 6. Final announcement 11/18

Claudio Saunt’s book, Unworthy Republic: The Dispossession of Native Americans and the Road to Indian Territory, has been named to the 2020 longlist for the National Book Award for Nonfiction.

“It’s a great honor to be one of the 10 authors selected for the National Book Award longlist. The category is nonfiction, not just history, and it is really gratifying to see Unworthy Republic next to biographies, journalistic investigations and first-person essays,” said Saunt, Richard B. Russell Professor in American History, Distinguished Research Professor and associate director of UGA’s Institute of Native American Studies.

In May 1830, the United States formally launched a policy to expel Native Americans from the East to territories west of the Mississippi River. Unworthy Republic reveals how expulsion became national policy and describes the chaotic and deadly results of the operation to deport 80,000 men, women and children.

This year, publishers submitted a total of 609 books for consideration in the nonfiction category.

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