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°Õ³ó±ðÌýÀ¶Ý®ÊÓƵ Centre for German Studies is happy to announce the winners of the 2025 Piller Award.

The winners are:

• Cole Sutherland, PhD student with the Department of Germanic and Slavic Studies – The Politicization of German Semiotic Landscapes. This project takes a linguistics-based approach to analyze the semiotic landscapes (SL) of six cities across Germany. By examining the language and signs found in those cities this project highlights the interactive nature of SLs and exposes the discourses and opinions hidden in plain sight.
• Sebastian Walsh-Murray, PhD candidate with the Department of History  – Deadly Definitions: Linguistic violence and Identity in the path to the Holocaust.ÌýThrough archival research on mid-level government functionaries, the propaganda ministry, Nazi party associations, media and culture, and personal testimonies, this project will research how Nazi language directed at Jews fostered Jewish people's "social death," how language acted as the first step towards genocide, and the impact on various Jewish identities.

The Cecilia and Late George Piller Graduate Research Awards were established to support excellent graduate students in the Faculty of Arts doing research into any aspect of German Studies.

The winners, chosen from a set of very strong applications, demonstrate the high calibre of the research into German studies being conducted by graduate students in the Faculty of Arts at the University of À¶Ý®ÊÓƵ. Each winner will receive a $4,000 prize to help fund their research.

For further information, please visit the Cecilia and Late George Piller Graduate Research Award website.Ìý

Questions? Please contact the À¶Ý®ÊÓƵ Centre for German Studies (wcgs@uwaterloo.ca).