Congratulations to the 2025 University of Michigan Press Book Award Winner!
The University of Michigan Press is excited to announce that the 2025 University of Michigan Press Book Award has been awarded to Rashmi Luthra for her book Destination Detroit: Discourses on the Refugee in a Post-Industrial City!
Luthra was honored at the annual University of Michigan Faculty Awards dinner. In listing this year’s honorees, the University Record explained “Her book, rooted in her experience as a descendant of refugees, has been accessed more than 1,300 times in 63 countries and garnered national acclaim for its penetrating exploration of xenophobia, Orientalism, and spaces for allyship, including art.”
Photo of Rashmi Luthra and Sales Manager Scott Ham at the Faculty Awards. Courtesy Rashmi Luthra.
About the Book:
Deindustrializing and revitalizing cities in the United States are at a particular crossroads when it comes to the contest over refugees. Do refugees represent opportunity or danger? These cities are in desperate need to stem population and resource loss. However, they are also dealing with local communities that are feeling internally displaced by economic and technological flux. Few U.S. locations provide a more vivid case study of this fight than Metro Detroit, where competing interest groups are waging war over the meaning of the figure of the refugee.
Destination Detroit: Discourses on the Refugee in a Post-Industrial City dives deeply into the discourse on refugees that various institutions in Metro Detroit are producing. The way in which local institutions talk about refugees gives us vital clues as to how they are negotiating competing pressures and how the city overall is negotiating competing imperatives. Indeed, the way various groups talk about refugees in Metro Detroit gives us a crucial glimpse into how U.S. cities are defining and redefining themselves today. The figure of the refugee becomes a slate on which groups with varied interests write their stories, aspirations, and fears. Consequently, we can figure out from local refugee discourses the ongoing question of what it means to be a Metro Detroiter now—and by extension, what it means to be a revitalizing U.S. city at this time.
About the Author:
Rashmi Luthra is Professor Emerita of Public Communication and Culture Studies at the University of Michigan–Dearborn. She has previously been honored with the U-M Regents' Medal for Dedicated Service and the U-M Dearborn Distinguished Academic Citizenship Award.
About the University of Michigan Press Book Award:
In 1965, President Harlan Hatcher announced the establishment of an annual University of Michigan Press Book Award. The award is presented to a member of the teaching and research staff (including emeritus members) of the University of Michigan whose book, published by the University of Michigan Press, has added the greatest distinction to the Press List. The cash value of the award is $1,500, and is apart from any royalties that may be earned. The selection is made from books published within a span of two calendar years. This year’s award was selected from books published between January 1, 2023 and December 31, 2024. Judges for the award are members of the Executive Committee of the University Press, the faculty board which controls the imprint of the Press. A list of previous award winners can be found here.
