A hundred years on from its birth, the music continues to speak to the heart — an art form that also serves as social commentary, communal history, and cathartic release.
The South
Posted inEssays & Criticism
Low Country, High Water: A Reading List for a South Under Climate Change
How do you love a place that is sinking?
Posted inCrime, Essays & Criticism, Highlight, Quote Posts, Quotes
How a Hurricane’s Trailing Winds Retold Willie Earle’s 1947 Mass Lynching
“Even with a preponderance of evidence and testimonies, every man on trial got away with murder. This fact was not front-page news but tucked beneath odd stories called ‘Flashes of Life.'”
Posted inArts & Culture, Books, Nonfiction, Story
Tom Petty’s Problematic Album Southern Accents
In 1985, one of rock ‘n’ roll’s most beloved songwriters made a regrettable misstep with a narrow conception of Southern identity.
Posted inArts & Culture, Books, Nonfiction, Story
Hellhound on the Money Trail
Standard recording contracts screwed Bluesmen out of royalties in the early 1900s, and the system was no different when Columbia released “Robert Johnson: The Complete Recordings in 1990.”
Posted inBusiness, Nonfiction, Quotes
One Georgia Farmer’s Experiment in Racial Equality
Minister Clarence Jordan founded Koinonia Farm in 1942 to be, in his words, a “demonstration plot for the kingdom of God.” Can it endure in our racially charged modern climate?
Posted inArts & Culture, Nonfiction, Quotes
The Life of One of the South’s Greatest Folklorists
Ernest Matthew Mickler wrote the best-selling White Trash Cookbook, but he was actually a skilled Southern folklorist, not a cook.
Posted inArts & Culture, Nonfiction, Quotes, Uncategorized
Searching for Poet Frank Stanford
Traveling to Arkansas to search for mythic poet Frank Stanford.
Posted inEssays & Criticism, Nonfiction, Story
Drinking Chai to Savannah: Reflections on Identity, Inclusion and Power in the South
On a girls’ road trip to Savannah with six of her immigrant friends, Anjali Enjeti recalls a traumatic racist incident she experienced as a teen—an interaction that framed her understanding of her otherness, in Georgia, and America.
Posted inEssays & Criticism, Nonfiction, Quotes
On Food, Family, and Love: A Recipe For Memory
At Oxford American, Ronni Lundy maps her past with family recipes.