Keith Tudor Honored with APA’s 2025 Carl Rogers Award for Lifetime Contribution
Keith Tudor receives the APA 2025 Carl Rogers Award for Distinguished Lifetime Contributions to Humanistic Psychology.
"Congratulations to Keith Tudor from all of us in the Australia Aotearoa New Zealand Chapter on receiving the APA 2025 Carl Rogers Award for Distinguished Lifetime Contributions to Humanistic Psychology. This is an amazing achievement, and thoroughly deserved. Following is an edited excerpt from the nomination to the award by Maureen O’Hara.
Keith’s vast portfolio examines core questions for contemporary humanistic psychologists in a diverse and tumultuous world. Though covering a wide spectrum of human concerns, the through-line of his work is opening spaces for authentic voices to be heard in their own situated idioms whether cultural, existential, or conceptual.
Since moving to Aotearoa New Zealand, he has been a leader in integrating humanistic psychology with indigenous Māori traditions and advancing post-colonial theory and practice, seeking bridges with humanistic approaches.
Most recently, Keith and I celebrated the culmination of a joint project, the publication of the Art, Science, and Hope of Humanism, a collection of my work selected and masterfully edited by Keith. In the dialogue following each chapter, Keith walks his talk as a person-centered facilitator holding space for new insights to emerge in the here-and-now, even about work written long ago. From start to finish, working with Keith in this dialogical process was transformative for me.
So, given my own relationship with Carl Rogers who was my PhD mentor and then my colleague for decades, being able to nominate Keith for an award that honors Carl’s legacy is sweet indeed.
In his acceptance speech, Keith acknowledges the significance of the award:
I am both honoured and humbled by receiving this Award not least as I find myself in prestigious company including esteemed colleagues such as Maureen O’Hara, Robert Elliott, Peter Schmid, Godfrey (Goff) Barrett Lennard, and Natalie Rogers, all of whom I know or knew. I am only the second person outside North America and Europe to win the award, the first New Zealander, and, the first whose primarily professional identity is as a social worker and psychotherapist – which reflects the broad and transdisciplinary nature of the project of humanistic psychology.
He goes on to highlight the breadth and diversity of his own work, including his contributions to humanism and humanistic psychology, critical thinking, cross-cultural psychology and thesupport of indigenous psychology, and research. In closing, Keith acknowledges the importance of honouring those who have come before us, and attending to their legacy:
I have always been interested in history and, as I grew up, the history and origin of ideas; and, especially since emigrating to and settling in Aotearoa New Zealand, the idea that is epitomised in the Māori whakataukī (or proverb) ka mua ka muri, the meaning of which points to walking backwards to the future. This interest in history, whakapapa (genealogy), and honouring elders, especially in the humanistic world, has led me to initiate and complete a number of legacy projects, including three books – about Maureen O’Hara, Evan Sherrard, and Claude Steiner – and a special issue of Person-centered & Experiential Psychotherapies – about Bernie Neville.
Once again, my profound thanks to the Society for bestowing this Award on me. In the current international political context of extreme attacks on humanism and humanistic values, I feel some weight of responsibility to continue to advocate for humanism and, as Maureen has so ably done in her work, to continue to express the hope of humanism. This Award both demands and supports me to do so.
It has been a profound privilege to work alongside Keith on various projects over the last decade, and to witness his passion and commitment to the person centred approach. I am personally delighted that Keith’s own legacy has been recognised, and that his name stands alongside other esteemed colleagues. To me, his contributions can be captured by the following Māori whakataukī:
He aha te kai o te rangatira – What is the food of a leader?
He kōrero, he kōrero, he kōrero – It is listening, it is knowledge, it is conversation
Ngā mihi nui,
Brian Rodgers
(On behalf of the Australia Aotearoa New Zealand Chapter)"