From 1964 to 2015, the ALS collaborated with Duke University Press to award the Norman Foerster Prize for the best essay published annually in the journal American Literature.

2015: Holly Jackson
2014: Elizabeth Freeman
2013: Lloyd Pratt
2012: Toni Jaudon
2011: Scott Selisker
2010: R. John Williams
2009: Nicholas Gaskill
2008: Nancy Glazener
2007: Birgit Brander Rasmussen
2006: Jeff Allred
2005: Geoffrey Sanborn
2004: Cherene Sherrard-Johnson
2003: Ed White
2002: Gillian Silverman
2001: Michael Warner with Natasha Hurley, Luis Iglesias, Sonia Di Loreto, Jeffrey Scraba, and Sandra Young
2000: Daylanne English
1999: Mary Pat Brady
1998: Amy Kaplan
1997: Lisa A. Long
1996: Chadwick Allen
1995: Carla Kaplan
1994: Caleb Crain
1993: Lauren Berlant
1992: Michael Warner
1991: Lora Romero
1990: Catherine Rainwater
1989: Richard Lyon
1988: Margaret Dickie
1987: Cynthia Jordan
1986: Joan Burbick
1985: David Hesla
1984: Karen Dandurand
1983: Michael North
1982: Christopher P. Wilson
1981: Thomas M. Walsh & Thomas D. Zlatic
1980: Robert A. Ferguson
1979: Bryan Short
1978: Stephen J. Tapscott
1977: Charles Scruggs, Philip Gura
1976: Robert Lee Stuart, William Andrews
1975: James Barbour
1974: Robert Marler
1973: Patricia Tobin, Eddy Dow
1972: Alan Howard
1971: Thomas Philbrick
1970: Margaret Blanchard
1969: Benjamin Spencer
1968: Lawrence Buell
1967: Robert Reilly
1966: Eugene Huddleston
1965: Daniel Fuchs
1964: Allen Guttmann