Movement and Migration Series Lecture: “Racist Kitsch for the Twenty-First Century? Anthropomorphic Asians, Kawaii-style, and the Culture of Cute” with Leslie Bow

We understand the harm embodied by mammy cookie jars, minstrel coin banks, and any number of household items depicting African Americans during the Jim Crow era, yet these demeaning anthropomorphic objects have found new iterations in the twenty-first century: the global circulation of the Asian figure as saltshaker, kitchen timer, and decor. How is it that such commodities manage to circumvent taboos surrounding ethnic caricature that now surround their infamous progenitors in the US South? How do these new forms of racial kitsch evade contextualization as racist kitsch?

In part, the answer lies in the rise of the Japanese style known as kawaii or “cute style” since the 1970s, an aesthetic form that has specific resonance for Asian racialization. This talk explores the racial feelings that the “cute” enables and draws upon narratives of African American collectors of black memorabilia to engage Asian Americans’ ambivalent relationship to racialized kawaii things.

Leslie Bow is Vilas Distinguished Achievement Professor of English and Asian American Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

SouthTalks is a series of events (including lectures, performances, film screenings, and panel discussions) that explores the interdisciplinary nature of Southern Studies. This series is free and open to the public, and takes place in the Tupelo Room of Barnard Observatory unless otherwise noted.

Movement and Migration Series Lecture: “From Latino Orlando to International Memphis: Migration and Transformation in the American South”  with Simone Delerme

In this SouthTalk, Simone Delerme will share her ethnographic research that documents the ways that southern places are being transformed by an influx of migrants, primarily Latino. How are these newcomers incorporated into the social, political, and economic life of communities that were nontraditional destinations of migration, and how are they challenging the South’s historic black-white racial binary?

Simone Delerme joined the University of Mississippi’s Department of Sociology and Anthropology and Center for the Study of Southern Culture in the fall of 2013. She specializes in migration to the US South, with interests in race relations, integration and incorporation, community development, and social class inequalities.

SouthTalks is a series of events (including lectures, performances, film screenings, and panel discussions) that explores the interdisciplinary nature of Southern Studies. This series is free and open to the public, and takes place in the Tupelo Room of Barnard Observatory unless otherwise noted.

Visiting Documentarians Series: “Always in Season”  with Jacqueline Olive

Jacqueline Olive is an independent filmmaker and immersive media producer with fifteen years of experience in journalism and film. Always in Season, her debut feature documentary, explores the lingering impact of more than a century of lynching and connects this form of racial terrorism with racial violence today. The film follows Claudia Lacy as she moves from paralyzing grief to leading the fight for justice for her son, Lennon Lacy, who was found hanging from a swing set in rural North Carolina in 2014. As the film unfolds, Lennon’s case—and the suspicions surrounding it—intersect with stories of other communities committed to breaking the silence of their own recent histories and leading the way to justice. This event is cosponsored by the Oxford Film Festival, March 18–22.

Always in Season

Listen to a Feb. 24 interview with NPR’s Robin Young.

SouthTalks is a series of events (including lectures, performances, film screenings, and panel discussions) that explores the interdisciplinary nature of Southern Studies. This series is free and open to the public, and takes place in the Tupelo Room of Barnard Observatory unless otherwise noted. This event is in the Overby Center Auditorium.

“‘Do you know what it means?’ New Orleans Englishes” with Christina Schoux Casey

Christina Schoux Casey is associate professor of English linguistics at Aalborg University, Denmark. Her research focuses on New Orleans Englishes and how language intersects with cultural commodification, neoliberal globalization, authenticity, and nostalgia. In her SouthTalk, Casey will discuss New Orleans language, from Who Dat! to bounce music to Vietnamese and French.

SouthTalks is a series of events (including lectures, performances, film screenings, and panel discussions) that explores the interdisciplinary nature of Southern Studies. This series is free and open to the public, and takes place in the Tupelo Room of Barnard Observatory unless otherwise noted.

“The Teacher-Shortage Crisis, the Alternate Route, and the Mississippi Teacher Corps Thirty Years Later” with Andrew Mullins

In this SouthTalk, Andrew Mullins discusses Mississippi’s teacher shortage and its causes, as well as the alternate route and the thirty-year history of the Mississippi Teacher Corps.

Andrew Mullins served as chief of staff to University of Mississippi chancellors, and worked under chancellors Gerald Turner, Robert Khyat, and Dan Jones. He is emeritus associate professor of education and a founder of the Mississippi Teacher Corps.

SouthTalks is a series of events (including lectures, performances, film screenings, and panel discussions) that explores the interdisciplinary nature of Southern Studies. This series is free and open to the public, and takes place in the Tupelo Room of Barnard Observatory unless otherwise noted.

Movement and Migration Series Lecture: “Slaughterhouse South: Migration, Ethnoracial Boundaries, and the Social Organization of Labor” with Vanesa Ribas

Drawing on sixteen months of work as a meatpacker in a North Carolina slaughterhouse, Vanesa Ribas investigates the intergroup dynamics between migrants and native-born workers, showing how the experience of oppressive exploitation mediates relations between Latina/o migrants, African Americans, and whites. Challenging conventional accounts, this research reveals the continued significance of white supremacy in the emerging arrangement of group statuses, experiences, and relations in a vastly transformed ethnoracial landscape.

Vanesa Ribas is an associate professor of sociology at the University of California, San Diego. She studies race/ethnicity, migration, labor, political mobilization, and social inequalities.

SouthTalks is a series of events (including lectures, performances, film screenings, and panel discussions) that explores the interdisciplinary nature of Southern Studies. This series is free and open to the public, and takes place in the Tupelo Room of Barnard Observatory unless otherwise noted.

“Black Food Geographies: Race, Self-Reliance, and Food Access” with Ashanté Reese

Using Washington, DC, as a launching point, this talk explores how structural racism shapes our national food system and how communities define, critique, and navigate contemporary food access inequities. Ashanté Reese is an assistant professor in the department of geography and environmental sciences at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County.

SouthTalks is a series of events (including lectures, performances, film screenings, and panel discussions) that explores the interdisciplinary nature of Southern Studies. This series is free and open to the public, and takes place in the Tupelo Room of Barnard Observatory unless otherwise noted.

“Burial Ground Is Common Ground: Connecting Communities through Research/Performance”  with Chuck Yarborough

Southern Studies alum Chuck Yarborough and students from the Mississippi School for Mathematics and Science will share and discuss the transformative individual and community impact of award-winning research/performance projects produced at their Columbus, Mississippi, school. The projects have been recognized nationally and have inspired similar programs throughout the country. The presentation will include brief performance excerpts.

Chuck Yarborough, who earned his Southern Studies MA in 1995, has taught high school history classes at the Mississippi School for Mathematics and Science since 1995. He has been recognized with multiple awards for teaching and community service, including being named 2019 Tachau Teacher of the Year by the Organization of American Historians and 2018 Social Studies Educator of the Year by the Mississippi Council for the Social Studies.

SouthTalks is a series of events (including lectures, performances, film screenings, and panel discussions) that explores the interdisciplinary nature of Southern Studies. This series is free and open to the public, and takes place in the Tupelo Room of Barnard Observatory unless otherwise noted.

Future of the South Initiative Lecture: “LGBTQ+ Activism and Advocacy in Mississippi”

Co-hosted by the Isom Center and part of the Oxford Pride schedule, we will hear from advocates and activists about their work to make Mississippi a more welcoming, safer, and fairer state for LGBTQ+ people.

SouthTalks is a series of events (including lectures, performances, film screenings, and panel discussions) that explores the interdisciplinary nature of Southern Studies. This series is free and open to the public, and takes place in the Tupelo Room of Barnard Observatory unless otherwise noted. This event will be in the Butler Auditorium at the Inn at Ole Miss.