The year seems to be flying by, and we're already announcing the August awardees!

This month's pick for the "Flairs' Choice Award" was /u/anthropology_nerd and her insight on "Pekka Hämäläinen writes in Lakota America that the 17th-century Haudenosaunee socially "adopted" their war prisoners to replace their own dead. What did that look like? How far did they commit to the change of identity?"

Meanwhile, the "Users' Choice Award" fell upon the shoulders of u/Cedric_Hampton and their response to "Did the USSR actually like the aesthetic of their architecture or was it a form of subliminal propaganda?"

This month's "Dark Horse Award", which recognizes the top-voted non-flair answer, despite hitting refresh several times seems to be in a dead heat! As such it goes to both /u/Craigellachie, who serenaded with "Gordon Lightfoot released his hit song "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald" less than a year after the ship sank. Was there any controversy at the time surrounding the quick release? Was the song viewed as exploitative?" and /u/gerardmenfin, who tackled "Question: Travel From Africa to France in the 1880s".

For this month's 'Greatest Question', voted on by the mods, goes to ""Notes from the Underground" was written in response to "What Is to Be Done?" which itself was a response to "Fathers and Sons" which was also a response but to the growing nihilist movement at the time. Was this normal at the time?, is this how Russians did philosophy back then?, by writing novels?". Not only a great question asked by /u/Frigorifico, but with a great answer from /u/Dicranurus to boot!

Finally, for the August "Excellent in Flairdom Award" we're recognizing a small group of flairs. While standalone submissions might be the questions - and subsequent answers - that get the most attention, every week sees a number of questions submitted to the 'Short Answers' thread, and there are a few flairs who are consistently active in that thread in particular who we want to recognize this month, and chosen based on both the volume and frequency of activity in the 'SASQ' thread over the past several months. As such, we want to highlight /u/y_sengaku, /u/welfontheshelf, /u/Bentresh, /u/Bodark43, /u/restricteddata, /u/b1uepenguin, /u/kochevnik81, and /u/voyeur324 for their deeply appreciated efforts there nearly every week.

As always, congrats to our very worthy winners, and thank you to everyone else who has contributed here, whether with thought-provoking questions or fascinating answers. And if this month you want to flag some stand-out posts that you read here for potential nomination, don't forget to post them in our Sunday Digest!

For a list of past winners, check them out here!