This award was subsumed into the Phoenix Award for Editorial and Design Achievement in 2020.
• 2019: Bulletin of the Comediantes
• 2018: Archives of Asian Art
• 2017: Southern Cultures
• 2016: ASAP Journal
• 2015: Journal of Mideast Women’s Studies
• 2014: Diacritics
• 2012: German Studies Review
• 2010: North Carolina Literary Review; Honorable Mentions: La corónica and White House History
• 2008: Kairos: A Journal of Rhetoric, Technology, and Pedagogy
• 2006: Southern Review; Runner-Up: Virginia Quarterly Review
• 2005: Hispanic Review; Runner-up: American Quarterly
• 2004: World Order
• 2003: Radical History Review
• 2002: Camera Obscura
• 2001: Theater
• 2000: Transition
• 1999: North Carolina Literary Review
• 1998: Signs
• 1997: Gettysburg Review
• 1996: Biblion: The Bulletin of the New York Public Library
• 1995: The Gettysburg Review; Runner-up: College Literature
• 1994: Parabola; Runner-up: Sycamore Review
• 1993: VIJ: Victorians Institute Journal; Runner-up: Critical Inquiry
• 1992: The Library Chronicle; Honorable mentions: American Literature, James Joyce Quarterly, Georgia Review, Gettysburg Review, and American Short Fiction
• 1991: Queen's Quarterly; Honorable mentions: Modern Philology, Prairie Schooner
• 1990: Women: A Cultural Review; Honorable mentions: Prairie Schooner, American Literary History
• 1989: Planet: The Welsh Internationalist
• 1988: The Gettysburg Review
• 1987: Southwest Review
• 1986: English Literary Renaissance
• 1985: Rhetoric Review
• 1984: Queens Quarterly
• 1983: Queens Quarterly
• 1982: Bulletin of Research in the Humanities
• 1981: Journal of Medieval and Renaissance Studies

In 2004, we began with the Parnassus Award for Significant Editorial Achievement, which was sunset in 2020.

This competition solicited a single issue, published within the previous 3 years, that constituted an unusually high realization of the belletristic journal's mission in combination with application of the highest standards of “learned” editorial practice—understood to encompass editing for selection of high-quality content, compelling arrangement of contents, style, visual appeal, and readability.

• 2018: Obsidian: Literature & Arts in the African Diaspora
• 2017: Grist
• 2010: Interfaces
• 2007: Margaret D. Bauer, North Carolina Literary Review; Runner-Up: Richard Mathews, Tampa Review
• 2004: Virginia Quarterly Review

This award was sunset after the 2019 MLA.

The recipient of the Codex Award is selected from journals covering the period before 1500. The journal can be in any discipline—history, literature, the arts, music, or any other field—or be interdisciplinary, and it can cover any area of that world as long as the majority of that coverage is in the 'ancient' or 'medieval' periods. The award is for distinction within this historical field, not necessarily for comprehensive coverage of it.
• 2019: The Journal of Late Antiquity
• 2017: Journal of Early Christian Studies
• 2016: Arethusa
• 2015: postmedieval
• 2014: Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies
• 2013: Journal of Late Antiquity
• 2012: Hesperia: The Journal of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens

This award was sunset after the 2019 MLA.

The Voyager Award will recognize excellence in any journal covering the period between 1500 and 1800. The journal can be in any discipline—history, literature, philosophy, music, or any other field—or be interdisciplinary, and it can cover any area of that world as long as the majority of that coverage is in the early modern period. Specialized and general journals may apply; the award is for distinction within this historical period, not necessarily for comprehensive coverage of it. Journals covering, say, both the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries—or any version of 'the long eighteenth century' are eligible for this award.
• 2019: Eighteenth-Century Life
• 2017: Eighteenth-Century Fiction
• 2016: Tulsa Studies in Women's Literature
• 2015: Eighteenth-Century Studies
• 2014: SEL
• 2013: Early Modern Women: An Interdisciplinary Journal
• 2011: Eighteenth-Century Fiction

• 2010: MaComère; Honorable Mention: College Literature

The Tallgrass Award honors the best journal in fields studying the North American continent (incl. Mexico) in all disciplines, including literature, history, politics geography, regional studies, and so on. A journal devoted to one American writer can qualify as can a journal covering a topic or subfield that is primarily addressed to north American locations. Journals publishing primarily fiction or poetry are excluded.
• 2010: MELUS

• 2010: Grey Sparrow