Reinstated!

To all of you in our community:

The Carl Brandon Society’s Steering Committee is very happy to announce that the U.S. Internal Revenue Service has reinstated our organization as an official 501 (c) 3 nonprofit, tax- exempt group–and furthermore that this nonprofit status has been made retroactive to the date it was first revoked, back in 2013. Donations to us are now itemizable for those past years as well as for all years going forward.

Although we’ve been presenting our Octavia E. Butler Scholarships during this temporary revocation period, and also have been actively pursuing the selection of winners of the Kindred and Parallax literary awards, you may have noticed a lull in our fundraising activities. Now that we can safely guarantee the 501 (c) 3 classification applies to us and all your gifts to us, please feel free to help us out!

Of course this great news inspires us to put more energy into our many programs–the Scholarships, the awards, the panels and parties and online discussions and all the other work the Carl Brandon Society carries out to support the presence of POC in the fantastic genres. It also sharpens our commitment to preventing the unfortunate miscommunications that originally caused the temporary revocation of our nonprofit status. To that end we expect to put together annual reports on what we’re doing, how we’re doing it, and where we stand financially and in terms of our programmatic goals. Look for the first of these reports by February 2018.

Last but indubitably not least, we want to thank you, our supporters, who have stood by us collectively and individually as we performed the necessary bureaucratic gyrations to achieve reinstatement. You are a powerful force for change, and your persistence and loyalty to our cause is what keeps us going.

Sincerely yours,
Nisi Shawl, Candra K. Gill, Victor J. Raymond, Victoria Elizabeth Garcia, K. Tempest Bradford, Lisa Bolekaja
Steering Committee of the Carl Brandon Society

Award Jury for 2012/2013 named

We’re very excited and grateful to be able to announce that the Carl Brandon Society’s awards process is under way!

The jurors who will select our 2012 and 2013 Parallax and Kindred Awards are: Jaymee Goh (chair), Kat Tanaka Okopnik, Dominica Phetteplace, Margaret Killjoy, Melissa Draughn, Bryan Kamaoli Kuwada, and Scott Nicolay. Deliberations on the works nominated begin Monday, April 4 and continue through Sunday, August 28, with announcements of the winners expected over the Labor Day weekend.

Up to $8000 in total will be presented to our 2013 and 2013 award recipients.

The Carl Brandon Parallax Award is given to the award year’s best work by a self-identified person of color which expands and explores our understanding of race. The Carl Brandon Kindred Award is given to the award year’s best work by a person of any race or ethnicity which expands and explores our understanding of race. For more on the awards and past recipients, go to http://carlbrandon.org/awards/.

Nominations for works to be considered for the 2014 and 2015 awards cycles will open soon.

To let us know of your availability and willingness to serve on future juries, fill out the survey here.

Thank you so much for supporting these important awards with your time, interest, and donations.