the the newsletter of the Center for the study of southern Culture • summer 2011 the university of mississippi New Faculty Members Join Center The Center welcomes four new faculty members to the Southern Studies program this fall. Bringing the number of Southern Studies faculty to 10, these professors will bring new specialties to the Center and add to current interests. Two of the new faculty members are tenure-track assistant professors in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology, and the other two will teach classes in both Southern Studies and history. Angela “Jill” Cooley Barbara Harris Combs comes to the Center from Georgia, where she has ence at Xavier University in her home- been teaching sociology at Shorter town of Cincinnati and receiving a law College. She received her PhD in soci- degree at Ohio State. Combs wrote a dis- ology at Georgia State University after Jodi Skipper sertation entitled “The Ties That Bind: studying both English and political sci- The Role of Place in Racial Identity Formation, Social Cohesion, Accord, and Discord in Two Historic, Black Gentrifying Atlanta Neighborhoods.” A joint appointment in Southern Studies and Anthropology, Jodi Skipper spent 2010 –11 as a postdoctoral fellow at the University of South Carolina. An anthropologist with archaeologi- cal training, Skipper wrote a disserta- tion at the University of Texas entitled “In the Neighborhood: City Planning, Archaeology, and Cultural Heritage Politics at St. Paul United Methodist Church, Dallas, Texas.” A Grambling BA graduate and native of Louisiana, Barbara Harris Combs Michele Grigsby Coffey continued on page 3 the D IRECTOR ’ S C OLUMN As I write, the movie version of The Help is about to come out. Based on the ex- Published Quarterly by traordinarily popular novel by Mississippi native Kathryn Stockett, The Help seems The Center for the Study of Southern Culture likely to become a popular reference point for talking about the South. It is intrigu- The University of Mississippi ing and ultimately mysterious how some movies become central to discussions about Telephone: 662-915-5993 the South and other movies do not. For example, one can refer to Steel Magnolias; Fax: 662-915-5814 E-mail: [email protected] Tyler Perry’s Madea movies; Gone with the Wind; Cool Hand Luke; I Am a Fugitive www.olemiss.edu/depts/south from a Chain Gang; Mississippi Burning; O Brother, Where Art Thou?; In the Heat of the Night; Cat on a Hot Tin Roof; and others with confidence that most people will know IN THIS ISSUE them, while countless equally interesting films (I’m a big fan ofA Face in the Crowd, Summer 2011 for example, and Passion Fish) seldom enter our discussions. 1 New Faculty Members Join Center As a book, The Help has been subject of a lively controversy. A story of four inter- 2 Director’s Column twined voices of women in early 1960s Jackson, the book tells about work in kitchens 3 Living Blues News and childcare and about limits and potential of careers for African American and white 4 Brown Bag Lunch and Lecture Series: women, raises issues of the definitions of family life, and dramatizes questions about the Fall 2011 nature of relationships between employers and employees who spend a great deal of time 4 Lynn & Stewart Gammill Gallery Exhibition Schedule under the same roof. Some readers were troubled that a white writer presumed to speak 5 Ann Abadie, Longtime Center in the voices of African American characters without showing enough conflict, suspi- Associate Director, Retires from Post cion, and potential resentment. For those readers, the book seems too easy. Other read- 6 Call for Papers: Faulkner & ers, criticizing the book from a different perspective, thought Stockett was too relent- Yoknapatawpha “50 Years after Faulkner” lessly harsh on most of the employers of The Help. One Southern Studies MA student 7 Charles Reagan Wilson Explores wrote a paper last year analyzing the various arguments she found on online chat sites. Southern Spirit in New Book Those arguments will likely continue, and I have no desire to address them here. What I 8 Education Volume Latest Release in New Encyclopedia Series, with Special like about the book version of The Help, and what I hope to see in the movie, is that it dra- Lecture Planned matizes the difficulty of doing good documentary work. The central character, nicknamed 9 Sally Lyon Leaves Center Staff Skeeter Phelan, is a smart, talented, and well-intentioned white University of Mississippi 9 Modern Political Archives graduate whose passion it is to gain greater understanding of the African American wom- 9 Southern Literary Trail—Trailfest 2011 en who work in the homes of white women in Jackson. Her efforts to get to know those 12 Media and Documentary Projects women, to report the stories right and complete, and to deal with them in a responsible Partners with Center way form the drama of the book. The book details her process of encouraging, editing, and 13 Southern Studies Academic Alums transcribing their material, which leads to the completion of an anonymously published 15 Reading the South 19 Southern Foodways Register book-within-the-book called The Help, with the names of its subjects also anonymous. 23 Faulkner & Yoknapatawpha 2011: If Skeeter were alive in 2011 she would be a Southern Studies student. She would “Faulkner and Geography” not be making up her own rules of how to do interviews—she would take SST 533 with 24 2011 Eudora Welty Awards David Wharton and study oral history techniques, ethics, and good and bad examples. She 24 Ripley Main Street Association Hosts might learn documentary photography, and she would volunteer to help at the Southern Faulkner Heritage Festival, November Foodways Symposium and Oxford Conference for the Book. In history, gender studies, and 4–5, 2011 Southern Studies classes she would read Cooking in Other Women’s Kitchens by Rebecca 25 12th Annual Faulkner Fringe Festival Moves to Prime Time Sharpless and maybe Within the Plantation Household by Elizabeth Fox-Genovese, and she 26 Contributors would study Mississippi in the civil rights era. In English, Southern Studies, and African 27 MIAL Awards Gala American Studies classes, she would read literature and memoirs, probably Ann Moody’s 29 19th Annual Mississippi Delta Tennessee Coming of Age in Mississippi and maybe Willie Mae by Elizabeth Kytle or Idella Parker’s Williams Festival, October 14–15, 2011 Idella: Marjorie Rawlings’ “Perfect Maid,” which address issues about domestic labor and 29 Two 2011 Book Conference Speakers what things people say and what they keep quiet. She would study the intersections of Receive Prestigious Awards class, economics, politics, gender, race, and labor in classes in the social sciences, and if she 30 Southern Culture Catalog were here this fall, she could take SST 555, Foodways and Southern Culture. If she did it REGISTER STAFF right, she could try to write her book as part of an MA or honors thesis. In a scholarly way, Editor: James G. Thomas Jr. she would think about the ethics of documentary work and the possibilities of romanticiz- Graphic Designer: Susan Bauer Lee ing or exoticizing or projecting or getting it all wrong, and she would do her best. Mailing List Manager: Mary Hartwell Howorth And today’s Skeeter could, in Southern Studies, learn how to make her own Editorial Assistant: Sally Cassady Lyon movie. Starting this fall, Southern Studies will have a closer-than-ever partnership Lithographer: RR Donnelley Magazine Group with Media and Documentary Projects. This partnership has been friendly and pro- ductive for several years, producing numerous excellent documentaries and teach- The University complies with all applicable laws regard- ing affirmative action and equal opportunity in all its ac- ing filmmaking techniques to rookie documentarians. Today’s Skeeter might take tivities and programs and does not discriminate against advantage of the University’s new cinema studies minor. And while making her anyone protected by law because of age, color, disability, national origin, race, religion, sex, or status as a veteran own film, she could study films by reading Deborah Barker and Katie McKee’s -ed or disabled veteran. ited volume, American Cinema and the Southern Imaginary, looking forward to the Page 2 Summer 2011 The Southern Register Media volume of The New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture, and taking a spring class with Zandria Robinson on issues Living Blues News in the films of Tyler Perry. With her Issue #214 of Living Blues is now on news- degree, she could do about whatever stands and includes a number of engaging in- she wanted, and would not, like 1960s terviews and features. Our feature story de- Skeeter Phelan, have to leave the state. tails the Memphis soul band the Bo-Keys. As I write, important changes, de- The current group mixes veteran ’60s and scribed elsewhere in this issue, are taking ’70s soul musicians with younger players who place. Four new faculty members are join- grew up loving their music. Two of the band’s ing the Center for the Study of Southern highest-profile vets are drummer Howard Culture, and the Center will have two Grimes and guitarist Charles “Skip” Potts. new associate directors. Our friend Sally We visit with them and get their take on the Lyon, who for six years has with great hu- Memphis soul scene then and now. mor dealt with registration issues, annu- LB also visits with 86-year-old West al reports, and the handwriting of two di- Virginia bluesman Nat Reese, a link to the rectors, is moving to Memphis with hus- bygone days when itinerant musicians en- band Dalton and daughter Lucy. And it tertained workers in the coal camps of the is not possible to describe what Associate region.