In a cultural climate based on the superficial, one has to wonder how much deeper the annual Elvis Death Day observances go than mere tradition and habit. Can such events be mined for anything worth knowing about the world we live in today? Was there more to be learned from Death Day ten years ago? Twenty years ago? Thirty? Those might be the most interesting questions of all to ask about what happens in Memphis on August 15.
Faculty Job Posting: Assistant Professor of Sociology or Anthropology and Southern Studies The Department of Sociology and Anthropology (socanth.olemiss.edu) and the Center for the Study of Southern Culture (southernstudies.olemiss.edu) at the University of Mississippi invite applications for a tenure-track Assistant Professor position in Sociology or Anthropology with a joint appointment in Southern Studies starting Fall …
Dr. Jodi Skipper and Dr. David Wharton have been documenting and studying black Mardi Gras celebrations in Lafayette, Louisiana for several years. Their research was just published in the Summer 2015 issue of The Southern Quarterly, a publication of the University of Southern Mississippi.
Last Friday, August 28, was the 60th Anniversary of the murder of Emmett Till in Money, Mississippi. On Saturday, the Emmett Till Interpretive Center in Sumner hosted several commemoration events, including tours of the newly renovated Sumner County Courthouse, where Till’s murderers were acquitted. Faculty members Ted Ownby, Jessie Wilkerson, Jodi Skipper, Katie McKee, and David Wharton attended the commemoration with several grad students. Below
The Delta Blues Museum in Clarksdale is offering a 3-Day Teachers Workshop covering the Mississippi Blues Trail on Tuesday, July 28 – Thursday, July 30. Several people from the Center and the University will be helping, including Ted Ownby, Scott Barretta of Highway 61 Radio, Greg Johnson of the University Blues Archive, and Derrick Harriell of the UM Department of English.
This week, my book Subduing Satan: Recreation, Religion, and Manhood in the Rural South, 1865-1920, turns 25 years old. I remember the date because the book showed up in my mailbox the weekend I turned 30. As birthdays go, the 25th year of a work of history really doesn’t call for or deserve much attention. But it intrigues me to think about it, so I hope anyone reading this will forgive me if writing about my aging book seems a combination of self-congratulation, penitence, and nostalgia. Heaven knows southern history already has plenty of all three.
I’m not absolutely sure I need a state flag. I don’t wave state flags or salute them or wear them on my clothing. But as a resident of Mississippi since the 1980s and as scholar and teacher in History and Southern Studies, I want a different flag than the one we have. I want a state flag that stands for equal access to the law, to education, to health care, and to safety and respect.
Two Southern Studies assistant professors are getting to use their passports this summer as recipients of the Provost’s Faculty Development Award for Campus Internationalization. Catarina Passidomo heads to Peru May 31–June 10 for “Peruvian Food Systems: Balancing Growth and Preservation,” and Jodi Skipper goes to Senegal June 7–17 for “Islam, Politics, and Culture in Senegal and West Africa.”
Dr. Jessica Wilkerson, who just completed her first year as Assistant Professor of History and Southern Studies, has just won an award from the Labor and Working Class History Association for her dissertation, “Where Movements Meet: From the War on Poverty to Grassroots Feminism in the Appalachian South.”
We’ve discussed Dr. Jodi Skipper’s work on the Behind the Big House project on the blog before. Here, news of a much-deserved honor for Dr. Skipper. This article, by Center intern Emily Beene, appears in the Spring 2015 issue of the Southern Register. Assistant Professor of Anthropology and Southern Studies Honored with Award of Merit …