Mississippi Humanities Council

Coming to America: How Immigrant Composers Have Enriched Our Musical Culture
2020-02-25 19:00 - 20:00 (America/Chicago) | Northeast Mississippi Community College, 101 Cunningham Blvd., Booneville, MS, 38829
Dr. Amanda Mattox, Humanities Teacher Award winner for Northeast Mississippi Community College, will present her public lecture:
Major European composers immigrated to the United States during the 1930s to escape oppressive political situations. This lecture surveys how these and other immigrant musicians have had a profound effect on concert music in America through composition and university teaching positions. Included in the presentation will be live performances of representative works.

Changing the World One Communicator at a Time
2020-02-25 18:00 - 19:00 | Itawamba Community College, 602 W Hill Street, Fulton, MS, 38843
Ms. Jessi Stevenson, Humanities Teacher Award winner for Itawamba Community College, will present her public lecture, “Changing the World One Communicator at a Time: A Discussion of Oxytocin, the Power of Storytelling, and the Importance of Dialogue in the Communication Process.”
“We take part in the communication process daily, but we often let our fear stifle true connection in this reciprocal process. This talk will empower you to harness the physiological reactions of communication by talking through strategies to help you better connect with your audiences on an emotional and engaging level.”

How History and the Humanities Can Fight White Supremacy
2020-02-24 18:00 - 19:00 | Mississippi University for Women – Fant Memorial Library, 1200 5th Ave S, Columbus, MS, 39701, United States
Dr. Kristi DiClemente, Humanities Teacher Awardee at Mississippi University for Women, will present her public lecture:
In the past few years, white supremacist groups have adopted historical imagery, and an imagined “pure” European past to argue against diversity and inclusion in all aspects of modern life. DiClemente will take on this ahistorical interpretation of the past and discuss how we as historians, and other humanities faculty, can fight against this imagery by actively decolonizing syllabuses and supporting the voices of underrepresented scholars.

SB: Parallels of Southern Storytelling & Folktales from Around the World
2020-02-21 19:00 - 20:00 | Blue Mountain College, 201 W Main Street, Blue Mountain, MS, 38610
Diane uses the art of storytelling to uncover folktales from the south, oral history from Mississippi, often paralleling these story motifs with folktales from around the world.
Speakers Expertise:
Diane Williams is a neo-griot, along the lines of the storytellers from times gone by when oral historians were crucial to maintaining black folks’ history because book publishers didn’t believe the history worth chronicling. Williams is also a quilter, an artistry befitting for a woman known for paying homage to the past. Williams uses silk yarns, beads, stones and vibrant colors to make traditional quilts with Motherland inspiration to tell stories of strength, resilience and hope.

Give me STEAM: Art Education as an Extraordinary Experience
2020-02-21 10:30 - 11:30 | Meridian Community College, 910 Hwy 19 N, Meridian, MS, 39307
Ms. Terrell Nicholson-Taylor will present her Humanities Teacher Award lecture for Meridian Community College:
The “A” for Art may be more important than the S T E M paradigm of education, because without the ability of artistic expression, these other fields may never have come into being. The very foundation of communicative thought and endeavor are bound to artistic, symbolic notation and hands-on learning and processes: the basis of all endeavors.

Ben Percy Public Readings
2020-02-20 19:30 - 20:30 | Mississippi State University, Bost Theater, Starkville, MS
Popular storyteller and fiction author Benjamin “Ben” Percy visits Mississippi State this month as a writer-in-residence, sharing from his publications, answering questions, visiting classes and meeting students and community members.
Percy presents a public address on Thursday [Feb. 20] at 7:30 p.m. in the Turner A. Wingo Auditorium of Old Main Academic Center, Room 1030.
On Feb. 21 at 4 p.m. at The Last Page, Starkville’s comic bookstore located at 101 S. Washington St., Percy will read from a selection of his works, answer questions and sign his publications.
Both events are free and open to the public.
As MSU’s writer-in-residence, he will interact with students, offering advice and tips to promote writing and storytelling.
“Mr. Percy specializes in literature, horror literature, and he also works on comic books and produces a Wolverine podcast,” said Julia Osman, director of MSU’s Institute for the Humanities and associate professor of history. “These genres and forms of literature, writing and storytelling are as included in the humanities as the deepest and most sensitive poetry.”

Calvin Coolidge on the Religious Foundations of Civilization
2020-02-20 19:00 - 20:00 | Blue Mountain College, 201 W Main Street, Blue Mountain, MS, 38610
Graduate Student Tom Tacoma

Dr. Thomas Tacoma, Humanities Teacher Awardee for Blue Mountain College, will present his public lecture: Dr. Tacoma’s will present on Calvin Coolidge’s principle of responsibility in public office. Coolidge faced numerous challenges as Governor of Massachusetts, President of the United States, and while out of office. In each step, he promoted his vision of responsible leadership.”

"Back in the Day" Black History Celebration: Youth Talent Showcase Explosion
2020-02-20 17:30 - 18:30 | New Hope Baptist Church, 5202 Watkins Dr., Jackson, MS, 39206
Annual Black history month programs featuring historical perspectives on the African American experience in Mississippi from slavery through Civil Rights and contemporary times. Feb. 20 will feature New Hope Christian School singers & dancers, as well as the Tougaloo College concert choir. Additionally, present on Feb. 20 will be a Hinds County election commissioner who will register those not registered to vote (especially young people.)

A Look Through Time: How Art and Culture Shaped the Study of Human Anatomy
2020-02-20 13:00 - 14:00 | Southwest Mississippi Community College, 1156 College Drive, Summit, MS, 39666
Dr. Melissa Adams, Humanities Teacher Award winner from Southwest Mississippi Community College, will present her public lecture:
The human body houses secrets that have fascinated philosophers, artists, and scientists throughout time. Cultural beliefs often slowed development of anatomy. Artists created illustrations that advanced knowledge of the human body. This presentation looks through history and discusses how culture and art shaped human anatomy.

The Shadow of Death: Southern Baptists and the Politics of Compassion in the Nigeria-Biafra War 1967-70
2020-02-19 16:00 - 17:00 | Millsaps College, 1701 N. State Street, Jackson, Mississippi, 39202
As the recipient of the Humanities Teacher Award at Millsaps College, Dr. Davis will give a public lecture on Wednesday, February 19, 2020 at 4:00 p.m. in the McMullen Lecture Hall (Room 122) in the Selby and Richard McRae Christian Center on the Millsaps College campus entitled, “The Shadow of Death: Southern Baptists and the Politics of Compassion in the Nigeria-Biafra War 1967-70.” The lecture will focus on the international politics of humanitarian efforts in Nigerian Civil War, a very personal and cathartic journey based on the his father’s time in Biafra. His story is just one of thousands of stories of heroism, self-sacrifice, and compassion that emerge from the human tragedy that was the Nigerian Civil War. Dr. Davis is currently working on a manuscript entitled “Heroes of Mercy.”

International Service-Learning: Faculty Engagement and Transformation
2020-02-19 14:00 - 15:00 | Belhaven University, 1500 Peachtree Street, Jackson, MS, 39202
Dr. Kristen K. White, Humanities Teacher Awardee for Belhaven University, presents her public lecture:
This qualitative study explored how international service-learning developed faculty personally and professionally. The 48 interviews from 17 faith-based universities found that if faculty engaged in all four of Kolb’s (1984) experiential learning stages, their commitment to service-learning increased and encouraged their continued participation in future service-learning opportunities benefitting their students.

The Academy Stories
2020-02-18 19:00 | Delta State University, 1003 W Sunflower Rd, Cleveland, MS, 38733, United States
Delta State University will host Ellen Ann Fentress, author, journalist, and documentary filmmaker, from February 17-19, 2020. On February 18 at 7pm, Ms. Fentress will present a public program about her latest project, “The Academy Stories.” A panel discussion will occur immediately following the presentation (Broom Hall, Baioni Conference Center.)

"1619" Myths and Memories of Slavery in the United States
2020-02-18 18:00 - 19:00 | Mississippi College, 200 Capitol St., Clinton, MS, 39056
Dr. Christian Pinnen, Humanities Teacher of the Year for Mississippi College, presents his public lecture:
The date “1619” has garnered more attention than in recent memory over the last couple of months. The year the first enslaved Africans arrived on the shores of the Virginia colony engenders a sort of intellectual reckoning with Americas past and the deep roots of slavery in the history of the country, but it also lays open the fault lines of our public discourse. I want to use this opportunity to talk about the role of the (digital) humanities at large in this debate, how historians include the story of slavery in the production of American history, and the difficulties historians encounter to cement the facts that surround the events in 1619. Engaging the public in a debate about the meaning of race and slavery in United States history is vital, yet controversial even 400 plus years after the first arrival of enslaved people on the Eastern Seaboard.

League of Women Voters 100th Anniversary Project
2020-02-18 18:00 | The Lyric, 1006 VanBuren Avenue, Oxford, MS, 38655
The League of Women Voters Oxford-North Mississippi will present a media project commemorating 100 years of womens suffrage (as well as the founding of LWV) at a February 18 celebration.

Ideas on Tap: Prison Re-Vision
2020-02-18 17:30 - 19:00 | Hal & Mal’s, 200 Commerce Street, Jackson, MS, 39201, United States
On February 18, join the Mississippi Humanities Council at Hal and Mal’s in Jackson for a program about prison reform in Mississippi.
The February 18 program will focus on the current unrest and violence in Mississippi prisons as a way to examine our larger relationship to the prison system, its history and role in our society, and the effects of possible reform efforts. Panelists include James Robertson (Empower Mississippi), Stephanie Rolph (Millsaps College), and Rukia Lumumba (People’s Advocacy Institute).
As always, snacks and great conversation are on us, and drinks are on you.

Medievalism: The Uses of the Middle Ages in the Modern World
2020-02-18 17:00 - 18:00 | University of Southern Mississippi, Hattiesburg , MS - Mississippi, 39406
Dr. Courtney Luckhardt, Humanities Teacher Awardee for the University of Southern Mississippi, presents her public lecture:
In order to make the history of the European Middle Ages relevant, it’s important for both students and the wider public to understand the way that the history of pre-modern period is used by modern people. Dr. Luckhardt teaches not only on the history of the Middle Ages itself (500-1500 CE), but also on “medievalism,” which is the use of ideas about the Middle Ages to serve contemporary needs. For instance, ideas about the glory of the Middle Ages have been used by white supremacists to reduce the real and complex history of the period to the supposed “white” origins of civilization. In order to bust myths about the so-called “Dark Ages”, we must re-examine our ideas about the past in light of cutting-edge scholarship, which can help us to shake off antiquated ideas that reflect neither pre-modern historical realities, nor who we are now in the 21st century.

The History and Phenomena of John Newton's "Amazing Grace!" within American Christianity and Beyond
2020-02-18 12:00 - 13:00 | Holmes Community College – Ridgeland Campus, 412 W. Ridgeland Avenue, Ridgeland, MS, 39157
John Robert Hall, Humanities Teacher Award winner for Holmes Community College, presents his public lecture:
In 1772, John Newton, former slave trader turned Anglican priest, wrote the words to the hymn titled “Amazing Grace!” Though published in 1779, “Amazing Grace!” remained a lesser known hymn in Great Britain; however, in the nineteenth century in the United States, it grew in popularity, gained a new verse, and secured its now recognizable hymn tune. From the end of the twentieth century into the twenty-first century, “Amazing Grace!” has become not only a popular song, both musically and lyrically, but often produces phenomena beyond the words of John Newton.

Time Bomb in a River: Ross Barnett, JFK, and 2 Million Pounds of Missing Chlorine
2020-02-18 11:00 - 12:00 | Mississippi Valley State University, 14000 US-82, Itta Bena, MS, 38941
Dr. Micah Rueber, Humanities Teacher Awardee for Mississippi Valley State University, will present his public lecture:
Rueber will present material he has gathered while working on a manuscript about a river barge that sank in 1961. While barge sinkings are not uncommon, this one drew the attention of President Kennedy because it was carrying 1000 tons of pressurized liquid chlorine that, if released, would threaten over 40,000 people in and around Natchez, MS. The subsequent clean-up efforts, which involved a wide range of both state and federal agencies, reveals how Mississippi governor Ross Barnett, while taking a very public stance against the federal government in refusing to admit James Meredith to Ole Miss, showed quite a different character behind the scenes, as he took great pains to make sure that the federal government spared no effort or expense in removing the dangerous material.

Bridging Cultures: Working for Equity Across Race, Class, Religion, and Ethnicity
2020-02-13 17:30 - 19:00 | International Museum of Muslim Cultures, 201 East Pascagoula Street, Jackson, MS, 39201
Through its “Bridging Cultures” Program, the International Museum of Muslin Cultures utilizes its two signature exhibitions: “Muslims with Christians and Jews: An Exhibition of Covenants and Coexistence,” and “The Legacy of Timbuktu: Wonders of the Written Word” to develop a series of programs and educational opportunities. IMMC’s Islamic Thought Institute engages local and national partners to host a series of conversations and/or panel discussions around the various themes of the two exhibitions.
The topic for February’s event is “The Struggle for Freedom in America,” A conversation about the African American freedom struggle, with a focus on the African American Muslim Movement and its connection to the Civil Rights Movement, as one freedom struggle. Speakers include: Imam Plemon El-Amin (Atlanta Masjid), David J. Dennis, Sr. (Southern Initiative Algebra Project), Dr. Safiya Omari (City of Jackson), and Khalid Hudson (Facilitator, Working Together Baton Rouge)

"Back in the Day" Black History Celebration: Tribute to Mississippi Living Legends
2020-02-13 17:30 - 18:30 | New Hope Baptist Church, 5202 Watkins Dr., Jackson, MS, 39206
Hezekiah Watkins, Mississippi Freedom Rider

Annual Black history month programs featuring historical perspectives on the African American experience in Mississippi from slavery through Civil Rights and contemporary times. Feb. 13 will feature Rep. Alyce G. Clark, Rev. Edwin King, Ms. Euvester Simpson, and Mr. Hezekiah Watkins.

Hiram Revels: The Nation's First African American Senator
2020-02-11 17:30 - 19:00 | Old Capitol Museum, 100 South State Street, Jackson , MS, 39201
MDAH will commemorate the 150th anniversary of the historic election of Hiram Revels as the first African American to serve in the U.S. Senate in a ceremony at the Old Capitol in Jackson on Tuesday, February 11, 2020, at 6 p.m. Eric Foner, DeWitt Clinton Professor Emeritus of History at Columbia University, will deliver the keynote speech for the program. His 1988 book “Reconstruction: America’s Unfinished Revolution, 1863–1877” was a groundbreaking survey of the Reconstruction Era, redefining the role of Hiram Revels and other African American elected officials during the period.
Hiram Revels
Dr. Eric Foner
“My lecture will discuss Hiram Revels’s career, before and after his term in the Senate, in the context of Reconstruction as a remarkable effort to create an interracial democracy in this country, and of the history of black officeholding in the United States,” said Foner. Other program participants include MDAH director Katie Blount; Birdon Mitchell Jr., pastor of Zion Chapel A.M.E. Church in Natchez; Felecia M. Nave, president of Alcorn State University; and Pamela D.C. Junior, director of the Two Mississippi Museums—the Museum of Mississippi History and Mississippi Civil Rights Museum. A reception and book signing will take place at 5 p.m. and the program will begin at 6 p.m. The program will take place in the historic House of Representatives Chamber in the Old Capitol Museum.

Exploring Community-Based Organizations as an Answer to Healthcare Disparities of the Mississippi Delta
2020-02-11 12:30 - 13:30 | Greenville Higher Education Center, 2900 US-1 South, Greenville, MS, 38701
Humanities Teacher Awardee for Mississippi Delta Community College, Jacquelyn Moore, will present her public lecture. Details TBA.

"Back in the Day" Black History Celebration: New Hope Legacy Night
2020-02-06 17:30 - 18:30 | New Hope Baptist Church, 5202 Watkins Dr., Jackson, MS, 39206
Annual Black history month programs featuring historical perspectives on the African American experience in Mississippi from slavery through Civil Rights and contemporary times. The February 6th event will feature guest speaker Dr. John A Peoples, Jr., retired President of Jackson State University.

SB:Slavery in Colonial Natchez: Cotton, Race, and Wealth before the Old South
2020-02-04 19:00 - 20:00 | South Mississippi Genealogy & Historical Society, 307 2nd Ave , Hattiesburg , MS
This presentation examines how slaves and colonists weathered the economic and political upheavals that rocked the Lower Mississippi Valley in the years between the American Revolution and the Civil War. Dr. Pinnen focuses on the fitful–and often futile–efforts of the English, the Spanish, and the Americans to establish plantation agriculture in Natchez and its environs, a district that emerged as the heart of the “Cotton Kingdom.” Within this setting, slaves seized on many weapons to claim their freedom and subsequently redefined the ever-changing meaning of race, slavery and freedom.
Speakers Expertise:
As a scholar of the colonial borderlands with a particular focus on race relations and slavery in Natchez, Dr. Christian Pinnen has written, researched and published on the subject for the last decade.

Packmule Educator: Building Readers and Writers One Book at a Time at CMCF
2020-02-04 13:30 - 14:30 | Eagle Ridge Conference Center, 1500 Raymond Lake Rd., Raymond, MS, 39154
Humanities Teacher Awardee for Hinds Community College, Laura Hammons, will present her public lecture. Details TBA.

Applied Sociology at Work: Working for Social Changes and Climate Injustice in Our Social World
2020-02-04 12:00 - 13:00 | JD Boyd Library, 1000 ASU Drive, Lorman, MS, 39096
Humanities Teacher Awardee for Alcorn State University, Earnestine Lee, will present her public lecture: “Faced with woefully inadequate societal evidence of increasing global warming, especially in terms of reducing carbon emissions, social scientists have recognized that climate change is a human problem caused by human actions. My research focuses on the long-term threat to human and collective action to improve it.”

SB: Black Women and the Suffrage Movement in Mississippi, 1863-1965
2020-01-30 18:00 - 19:00 | Mississippi University for Women, 1100 College Street, Columbus, MS, 39701
Black women in Mississippi actively participated in the suffrage movement after the Civil War. They fought actively for women’s suffrage even as they supported Black men and passage of the 15th Amendment. With passage of the 19th Amendment in 1920, Black women could not claim victory. It would take another 40 years before they could exercise the right to vote. White supremacy robbed Black women of the right to vote. White women, who should have been allies in the fight for women’s suffrage, turned their backs on Black women. Black women, then, fought both racism and sexism in the struggle for the right to vote. They created a vibrant, active political culture that began during the Civil War. They attended political rallies, campaigned and raised money for candidates, monitored polling places, and counted ballots. They participated actively in political clubs, first in Loyal Leagues and later in Republican Clubs. Black women built a vibrant political culture in the church, secret societies, clubs, and even their independent enterprises. They did so despite being shunned by White women suffragists; subjected to extralegal racial sexual violence and economic repression by Whites; and undermined by the sexism of Black men. This presentation provides an overview of the 100-year-fight by Black women in Mississippi to maintain their place in public political discourse, from the Civil War to passage of the Voting Rights Act in 1965.
Speakers Expertise:
A scholar of black women’s history, Dr. Garrett-Scott teaches courses at the University of Mississippi in the Departments of History and African American Studies. She is a specialist in the history of gender, race and the political economy in the United States with a particular emphasis on black women in business in the early twentieth-century South. In addition to teaching a course about Mississippi daughter Oprah Winfrey, she teaches a course on Black Mississippi History. She published an article in an international business history journal on Minnie Cox of Indianola, who, after being the target of extralegal violence during the Indianola Affair (1902-1903), co-founded one of the earliest black-owned banks in Mississippi and the first black-owned insurance company in the country to offer whole life insurance, the Mississippi Life Insurance Company.
*Presentation will take place in the Nissan Auditorium in Perkinson Hall

SB: The Mississippi Plan and the Rise of Jim Crow
2020-01-21 11:30 - 12:30 | Mississippi University for Women, 1100 College Street, Columbus, MS, 39701
After the Civil War, African Americans in the South, newly freed, expressed a tangible optimism that led to the reuniting of families, the development of social institutions like the black church, the rise of cultural expressions like the Blues and jazz, the establishment of black-owned businesses and other economic endeavors, and the wielding of significant political power. On the other hand, as Dr. Luckett explains in this talk, most white southerners, especially in Mississippi, saw this rise of black social, economic and political power as a direct threat to their hegemony, which had been so well established during the era of slavery, and whites sought to “redeem” their place in the southern hierarchy through violent extra-legal measures like lynching and through the realm of law. The invention of Jim Crow and what became known as the “Mississippi Plan” became the models for the rest of the South. The Mississippi Plan and Jim Crow stood on the shoulders of black disfranchisement, segregation and sharecropping to guarantee white power as well as second-class citizenship for African Americans throughout the South, a status black southerners have fought ever since.
Speakers Expertise:
As a Civil Rights historian, Dr. Luckett’s expertise is on the modern Civil Rights Movement and the African-American experience. As director of the Margaret Walker Center at Jackson State University, Dr. Luckett has become an expert on Walker’s life and her experiences, especially as they related to the Black Arts Movement of the 20th century.

*Presentation will take place in the Pope Banquet Room of the Hogarth Building

50th Recollection of Gibbs-Green: MLK Convocation
2020-01-17 10:00 - 12:00
In the spring of 1970, college and university students across the country protested against the Vietnam War, racism, gender oppression, and a host of other issues, at times leading to violent and deadly confrontations with police and national guard troops. On May 14th, 1970, students at Jackson State College staged a demonstration condemning racial discrimination in Mississippi and the killing of four students at Kent State University by the Ohio National Guard on May 4th. The demonstration continued into the night. Shortly after midnight on May 15th, police, who claimed they had been shot at, opened fire on students gathered outside Alexander Hall, a campus dormitory. When the shooting stopped, 21-year-old Phillip Gibbs and 17-year-old James Green lay dead. twelve other students were injured.
The 50th anniversary commemoration of the shooting on what is now the campus of Jackson State University will include five major programs. The Student Government Association, Gibbs-Green Commission, and Gibbs-Green Oral History Project developed the programs which will coordinate with Kent State University to link the events on both campuses.
January 17 Event:
The first event is the Martin Luther King, Jr. birthday convocation and For My People awards ceremony scheduled Friday, January 17th in the Rose McCoy auditorium and JSU Student Center Ballroom, respectively, where Phillip Gibbs and James Green will be remembered and honored.

Bridging Cultures: Working for Equity Across Race, Class, Religion, and Ethnicity
2020-01-09 08:00 - 17:00 | International Museum of Muslim Cultures, 201 East Pascagoula Street, Jackson, MS, 39201
Through its “Bridging Cultures” Program, the International Museum of Muslin Cultures utilizes its two signature exhibitions: “Muslims with Christians and Jews: An Exhibition of Covenants and Coexistence,” and “The Legacy of Timbuktu: Wonders of the Written Word” to develop a series of programs and educational opportunities. IMMC’s Islamic Thought Institute engages local and national partners to host a series of conversations and/or panel discussions around the various themes of the two exhibitions.
The topic for January’s event is “Two Americas: The Aspirational and the Real,” A conversation about America’s history of slavery and remedies for equity and healing.
