Kappa Tau Alpha, the national college honor society founding in 1910 for scholarship in journalism and mass communication, has recognized research contributions to the field since the inauguration of the award in 1944. The winning author receives a $1000 prize.

Entries are judged by a panel of university professors of journalism and mass communication and national officers of Kappa Tau Alpha.

Kathy Roberts Forde won the award for the best book published in 2008 for Literary Journalism on Trial: Masson v. New Yorker and the First Amendment. (University of Massachusetts Press). "This is a book about the significance of a legal case, but it is also about history, philosophy, ethics, language, civic culture, politics, media ideology and more," writes Jane B. Singer (University of Iowa/University of Central Lancashire), KTA president and a finalist judge. "Overall, this book makes a splendid and thought-provoking contribution to the literature across a range of subject areas that are not nearly as distinct as we make them out to be," concludes Singer.

Steven Casey took runnerup honors for Selling the Korean War: Propaganda, Politics and Public Opinion 1950-1953.(Oxford University Press), a meticulous analysis of the Truman and Eisenhower administrations' efforts to gain political support for their approach to waging the Cold War. "Casey's book is detailed, engaging, admirably researched, and confidently written. It offers important insights into the complex government-media-public policy relationships during what was both 'the forgotten war' and 'the first hot war' of the Cold War era," writes W. Joseph Campbell (American University), KTA vice-president and a finalist judge.

Janice Peck earned third place with The Age of Oprah: Cultural Icon for the Neoliberal Era.(Paradigm Publishers). The book is almost as much about American society at the beginning of the 21st century as it is about the cultural icon Oprah has become.

Other finalists were Loren Ghiglione for CBS's Don Hollenbeck: An Honest Reporter in the Age of McCarthyism; James McPherson for The Conservative Resurgence and the Press: The Media's Role in the Rise of the Right; and Jan Whitt for Women in American Journalism: A New History.

Books with a 2009 copyright will be received until Dec. 7, 2009. Books with a 2009 copyright received after the entry deadline may be accepted in the current year's competition if arrangements are made prior to the deadline. Entries that cannot be accomodated will be held over to the following year.

Edited volumes (i.e., collected works by several authors), textbooks and revised editions previously entered are not eligible. Paperback editions are acceptable. To enter, send six copies to: