Sarat is the sole recipient of the James Boyd White Prize in 2006. ASLCH generally distributes the award to professors at colleges and universities who have demonstrated a distinguished body of work from a "humanistic" perspective. Recipients of the award have innovatively contributed to the field of law through their significant academic endeavors and scholarly research.
"The [ASLCH] is the biggest association of this type for interdisciplinary legal scholarship, and it focuses from a humanistic perspective," said Sarat. The ASLCH encourages dialogue among scholars concerning issues of interpretation, identity, values, authority, obligation, justice and law's place in culture, according to the University of Texas at Austin's Web page on the association's eighth annual meeting held in Austin in March 2005.
ASLCH is composed of individuals who engage in interdisciplinary, humanistic-oriented scholarship on legal theory and jurisprudence, law and cultural studies, law and literature, law and the performing arts, legal history and legal hermeneutics.
Sarat also received an award in 1997 from the Law and Society Association, which is composed of a group of scholars from different countries interested in law's place in social, political, economic and cultural life. Sarat was a co-recipient of the Harry J. Kalven Jr. Prize, which recognizes distinguished scholarly achievement in law and the social sciences."[Law and Society] functions from a social science perspective and is also interdisciplinary in nature," said Sarat. "It is rather unusual that a single person would receive both of these awards-one from the social sciences perspective and the new James Boyd White Prize from the humanistic perspective."
The Law and Society Association awarded Sarat with the Harry J. Kalven Prize for his major contributions to the field of socio-legal research. The Society claimed that his studies combined careful empirical and conceptual work on violence and the law in its various forms. He was also awarded in 1997 for his intellectual leadership in introducing new methodologies and traditions of scholarship to the field of law and sociology.
The James Boyd White Prize was awarded to Sarat in recognition of his entire scholarly body of work. ASLCH emphasized that Sarat's last book entitled "Mercy on Trial: What it Means to Stop an Execution" was innovative in both form and content. "The association explained that 'Mercy on Trial: What it Means to Stop an Execution' represented a distinctive and unusual combination. It is a combination of historical, philosophical, cultural and local perspectives, and is thus unusually innovative," said Sarat.
Sarat discussed his reaction to receiving the prestigious James Boyd White Prize. "I was honored, thrilled and moved to receive the award. It means a lot to a scholar to be represented by peers, who respect his entire body of work and scholarship at other colleges and universities," he said. The James Boyd White award is not a book prize, but was rather given in recognition of Sarat's scholastic achievement, after careful evaluation from peers.
James Boyd White, the individual after whom the award is named, is a graduate of Amherst College and currently serves as the Hart Wright Collegiate Professor of Law at the University of Michigan. He is also a professor of English and adjunct professor of classical studies. "James Boyd White was central to the invention of the field of law in the 'humanities.' He is also a pioneering figure in the field of law," said Sarat.
Sarat also explained his current projects and his future academic endeavors. "I am currently working on a new book on the relationship between law and film. The book is called 'Hollywood's Law: What Movies do for Democracy,'" he said. "I am also working on a new project on race and capital punishment concerning the impact of race on the history of capital punishment."
In addition to the book, Sarat continues to delve into topics concerning justice and legality. "I am writing on the miscarriages of justice in the American legal system-what produces them, when they occur, and what they have to tell about the American legal system," he said.
Sarat also currently serves as editor of the Law, Culture, and Humanities Journal. It is publication of the Association for the Study of Law, Culture and the Humanities and is co-sponsored by Amherst College and the Socio-Legal Research Center at Griffith University in Australia. The journal is interdisciplinary in nature and focuses on "humanistically oriented legal scholarship."
Additionally, Sarat serves as president of the Consortium of Undergraduate Law and Justice Programs. The Consortium is an organization for colleges and universities that have interdisciplinary programs geared toward undergraduate education about law and justice internationally and in the United States. Sarat is also currently editor of the Studies in Law, Politics, and Society, which publishes interdisciplinary research on law.