Meet Our First Year Graduate Students

One of the most compelling aspects of the Center for the Study of Southern Culture is its eclectic faculty, staff, and students. This fall the Center welcomed 12 new students into its Southern Studies MA program, all of whom contribute to the Center’s notable diversity.

Ted Ownby on Elvis Presley as a Southern Studies Student

Center Director Ted Ownby wrote the introduction for a new book on Elvis Presley by Joel Williamson, Elvis Presley: A Southern Life. Here, his thoughts on whether Southern Studies might’ve saved Presley. Elvis Presley died in 1977. That was the same year the Center for the Study of Southern Culture hosted its first events, and

Save the Date for the 2015 Blues Today Symposium

Mark Camarigg of Living Blues magazine with news of the 2015 Blues Today Symposium, this year focused on North Mississippi Hill Country Blues. Since 2003, Living Blues magazine has sponsored the Blues Today Symposium each spring on the University of Mississippi campus.  The Symposium has featured such keynote speakers as Paul Oliver, Samuel Charters, and Bill Ferris

Grad Student Guest Post: Virginia Anderson on Determining a Thesis Topic

Today, another guest post from a grad student, this time from a second year who is hard at work on her thesis.  Virginia Anderson grew up in Staunton, Virginia and holds an undergraduate degree in English and religious studies from UM and a master’s in religious studies from the University of Colorado, Boulder.  Her research

The Southern Foodways Symposium in Review

This past weekend, Center institute the Southern Foodways Alliance hosted their 17th annual symposium.  They posed the question “Who is welcome at the welcome table?” and presented three days of lectures, films, conversations, and meals exploring inclusion and exclusion in southern foodways.  We’re proud of the SFA’s ability to generate thoughtful discussion of an experience

Grad Student Guest Post: Sophie Hay on Applying to Grad School

We’ll feature an occasional post by our Southern Studies grad students.  First up, Sophie Hay, who comes to us from the University of Birmingham in the U.K.  She’s a first year in the Southern Studies Master’s program.  Her research interests include the civil rights movement, gender, and African American literature. Thinking of applying to Graduate

New Gammill Gallery Photography Exhibit on the Mardi Gras Indians

The Gammill Gallery in Barnard Observatory has a new exhibit of photographs by Pableaux Johnson.  The gallery, which hosts about four exhibits of documentary photography each year, is free and open to the public 9am to 5pm, Monday – Friday. Pableaux Johnson is a writer and photographer based in New Orleans. His work has appeared regularly

Professor and Students Participate in Program Examining Slave Dwellings

This article, by Dr. Jodi Skipper, originally appeared in the Spring 2014 issue of the Southern Register.  Check out our archive of past Registers for more. Interpreting the Enslaved: The Behind the Big House Program in Holly Springs, Mississippi For the past two years, Southern Studies students have helped to fill gaps in Mississippi interpretations

SouthDocs Film Tells of Governor Winter’s Battle for Education Reform

The Toughest Job: William Winter’s Mississippi, a documentary directed by Matthew Graves for the University of Mississippi’s Southern Documentary Project (SouthDocs), chronicles the life and career of Mississippi’s 57th Governor William Winter and his fight to pass the 1982 Education Reform Bill. Broadcast Premiere October 2 Mississippi Public Broadcasting will air the premiere statewide broadcast

SFA/Winter Institute Grad Student Conference to include talk by Author of CITIZEN COKE

Beginning this Thursday, September 25, the Southern Foodways Alliance and the William Winter Institute for Racial Reconciliation will host a graduate student conference at the University of Mississippi to study inclusion and exclusion in American foodways. Here’s how the SFA and Winter Institute describe the mission of the conference, which will bring grad students from