Mississippi Humanities Council

"Baltimore" Performance & Discussion
2019-03-02 15:30 - 17:00 (America/Chicago) | Meraki Roasting Company, 282 Sunflower Ave, Clarksdale, MS, 38614, United States
The Sunflower County Freedom Project youth drama will present Baltimore, a play by Kirsten Greenridge. Baltimore focuses on a group of college students whose lvies are shaken when someone draws an offensive picture of the wall of their residence hall. The play shines light on issues of equality, racism, community, and the question of who gets to belong where. After the performance, the students and audience will participate in a facilitated conversation.

HTA: Flow and Music
2019-03-05 10:30 - 11:30 | M.P. Bush Fine Arts Auditorium, Bush Drive, Ellisville, MS, 39437
Humanities Teacher Award winner Dr. Lindsay Keay (Jones County Junior College) will present her public lecture, “Flow and Music.”
The term flow can be described as a state of heightened concentration and arousal where a balance of skill and challenge cause someone to be so absorbed in a task that everything else seems to disappear. The result of the experience can be one of immense enjoyment and satisfaction. This presentation discusses how musical activities lend themselves well to the flow experience due to the multifaceted tasks of listening, practicing, performing, or teaching music.

HTA: Bulgarian Art Song: History, Development, and Performance
2019-03-05 19:00 - 20:00 | William H. Zeigel Music Center, 1003 W Sunflower Rd, Cleveland, MS, 38733
Humanities Teacher Award winner Dr. Jamie Dahman (Delta State University) will present a public lecture, “Bulgarian Art Song: History, Development, and Performance”

Bulgarian Art Song, largely unexplored and unperformed in the United States, has a rich tradition and history and deserves a place among the standard repertoires of Classical Art Song. On Tuesday, March 5, 2019 at 7 p.m., Dr. Jamie Dahman, a Fulbright alumnus who studied in Bulgaria, will present a lecture-recital at Delta State University on the history and development of the Bulgarian Art Song.

HTA: "Conversation" in Philosophy and Art
2019-03-06 15:00 - 16:00 | Shackoul’s Honors College, 500 Bailey Howell Drive, Mississippi State, MS, 39762
Humanities Teacher Award winner Dr. Kristin Boyce (Mississippi State University) will present her public lecture titled, “”Conversation” in Philosophy and Art.” Reception to follow.
This presentation will explore the importance of the “art” of conversation (as distinguished from argument or debate) for teaching in the Humanities. It will explore the special ways in which the study of philosophy and the arts can facilitate the development of this art.

HTA: Song Anatomy
2019-03-12 18:30 - 19:30 | Vickers Auditorium, 275 W Broad Street, Decatur, MS, 39327
Humanities Teacher Award winner Chas David Evans (East Central Community College) will present his public lecture titled, “Song Anatomy.” Reception to follow.

HTA: William Blake
2019-03-19 13:00 - 14:00 | William Carey University, 710 William Carey Parkway, Hattiesburg, MS, 39401
On March 19, William Carey University’s Humanities Teacher Award winner Dr. Marsha Newman will present a program on William Blake. The program will be free an open to the public, is part of the MHC’s Humanities Teacher Award program to recognize outstanding humanities teachers at Mississippi’s colleges and universities.
The program will take place in the Fail-Asbury Nursing Building. A reception will follow.

HTA: Overlooked No More: Women's History in the Classroom and Beyond
2019-03-19 17:00 - 18:00 | USM Liberal Arts Building, 114 N. 31st Ave., Hattiesburg, MS, 39401
Humanities Teacher Award winner Dr. Allison Abra (University of Southern Mississippi) will present her public lecture, “Overlooked No More: Women’s History in the Classroom and Beyond.” Reception to follow.
This lecture will explore strategies for restoring the voices and experiences of “overlooked” women in the history classroom and historical scholarship. It will reflect on how to negotiate a balance between making women a central part of the historical narrative, and avoiding ghettoizing their experiences as separate and distinctive. In particular, the lecture will use as a case study the history of the British women who served as secret agents in Nazi-occupied Europe during World War II, in order to explore the mechanisms by which some women get remembered by history, while others get forgotten.

Ideas on Tap: Locked Out: Criminal Justice in Mississippi
2019-03-19 17:30 - 19:00 | Hal & Mal’s, 200 Commerce Street, Jackson, MS, 39201, United States
On March 19, join the Mississippi Humanities Council for the second in a two-part series on criminal justice in Mississippi.
The March 19 program, “Locked Out: Criminal Justice in Mississippi” will examine the process of re-entry back into society for formerly-incarcerated individuals. Hear from former Parchman inmate Eddie Spencer, Mississippi Center for Justice Advocacy Director Beth Orlansky, and director of the Incarcerated Veterans Program at Central Mississippi Correctional Facility B.R. Hawkins. Journalist Ko Bragg will moderate.
As always, snacks and great conversation are on us, and drinks are on you.

The Struggle Continues: Equity in Education
2019-03-19 18:30 - 19:30 | Hancock Performing Arts Center, 7140 Stennis Airport Rd, Kiln, MS, 39556, United States
“The Struggle Continues: Equity in Education” is a series of three lectures that centers on the history of equity in public education. The series will examine today’s political climate and the role of the federal, state, and local governments in education, and will consider the ways citizens can play a role in equity in education. The March 19 lecture will be presented by William Coleman of the Hancock County Historical Society, who will examine the experiences of African Americans, Asians and Hispanics in Hancock, Harrison, and Jackson counties, in their pursuit of education.

SB: The Historic Journey of African American Quilters
2019-03-21 11:00 - 12:00 | Country Club of Jackson, 345 St. Andrew's Drive, Jackson, MS, 39211
Diane Williams, storyteller and fiber artist, begins her presentation with a discussion of Kente cloth weaved fibers of West Africa and moves on to utilitarian quilts made by African slaves in America who sewed for their owners. She provides a reflective look at how the designs of Underground Railroad quilts relate to storytelling, and explores the works of Harriet Powers (1837-1910) and three other female fiber artists. Powers was a model for women quilters of the late 19th-early 20th centuries. In her discussion of 20th and 21st century quilting, she uses the work of Faith Ringgold, Carolyn L. Mazloomi and Mississippi quilter/fiber artist Gwen Magee. Williams uses her storytelling skills to explore how images — in pictures, but also in quilts — can guide us to a place of tolerance, empathy and sensitivity.
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.

HTA: Literature in Relief: Healing in the Human Spirit
2019-03-21 15:00 - 16:00 | Golden Triangle Lyceum, 8731 S. Frontage Rd., Mayhew, MS, 39753
Humanities Teacher Award winner Ginny Leonard (East Mississippi Community College) will present her public lecture, “Literature in Relief: Healing in the Human Spirit.” Reception to follow.
The strength of the written word does not rely on simple fact-giving or storytelling. Instead, the true power of literature rests in its ability to soothe and heal the mind, body, and soul of humankind. This presentation will explore the many ways literature of all sorts relieves the pressures of the human condition.

Ideas on Tap Oxford: The Future of Journalism
2019-03-21 17:00 - 18:30 | Rafters, 1002 Jackson Avenue East, Oxford, 38655, United States
On March 21, join the Mississippi Humanities Council and the Overby Center for Southern Journalism and Politics at the Annex at Rafter’s Music and Food in Oxford for “Ideas on Tap: The Future of Journalism.”
This special Oxford edition of Ideas on Tap will focus on the role of community journalism in our society and how economic restraints affect how journalism is produced and disseminated. Hear from panelists R.L. Nave (Mississippi Today), Cynthia Joyce (University of Mississippi School of Journalism and New Media), and Elizabeth Zaremba Walters (Daily Journal). Charles L. Overby will moderate.
This program is supported by the The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation’s “Democracy and the Informed Citizen” initiative, in partnership with the Federation of State Humanities Councils.
The MHC will provide appetizers and attendees are welcome to purchase their own drinks. As always, this event is free and open to the public.

HTA: Fallen Ministers and Reformed Seductresses...
2019-03-21 19:00 - 20:00 | Garrett Auditorium, 201 W Main Street, Blue Mountain, MS, 38610
Humanities Teacher Award winner Dr. Mikki Galliher (Blue Mountain College) will present her public lecture titled, “Fallen Ministers and Reformed Seductresses in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter and Alice Cary’s Hagar, A Story of Today.” Reception to follow.
Nathaniel Hawthorne’s classic text has much in common with another novel, Hagar, A Story for Today by Hawthorne’s contemporary Alice Cary. Both novels feature a young woman who is seduced, impregnated, and then betrayed by her lover. However, while Hawthorne’s novel is a beloved classic studied in high school and college classrooms, Cary’s work has fallen into obscurity, unchampioned even by most feminist recovery projects despite Cary’s popularity and influence during her lifetime. I posit that much of the reason for the disparity in reception lies in the way that Hawthorne’s text elicits empathy for the male seducer, while Cary does not.

SB: Music of the War Between the States, 1861-1865
2019-03-22 09:00 - 15:00 | Mississippi’s Final Stands Interpretive Center and Battlefields, 1067 Highway 370, Guntown, MS, 38849
Music of this period played on the Appalachian Mountain dulcimer, banjo-mier and wooden spoons. Period clothing worn. Audience may help play the spoons.
Speakers Expertise:
Mr. Arinder has studied Early American and Native American cultures for nearly 50 years, assembling a sizeable collection of artifacts which he uses to leade living history programs for local schools, civic clubs and museums. He volunteers as an interpretive historian with the Natchez Trace Parkway, leading monthly history and pioneer craft demonstrations at the Visitor Center in Tupelo.

SB: Southern Wisdom from Delta Church Mothers
2019-03-22 13:00 - 14:00 | Millsaps College, 1701 N. State Street, Jackson, Mississippi, 39202
Award-winning journalist Alysia Burton Steele’s Delta Jewels: In Search of My Grandmother’s Wisdom is a visual and lyrical tribute to African American church mothers from the Mississippi Delta. This groundbreaking collection of oral histories and photographs tells nationally and internationally significant stories rooted in the Mississippi Delta, a distinctive region called “The Cradle of American Culture” by the National Park Service and “The Most Southern Place on Earth” by historian James Cobb.The Mississippi Delta produced cotton, Blues music and the Civil Rights Movement. It shaped the lives and contributions of numerous cultural and social justice icons—black and white, women and men—including Fannie Lou Hamer, Eudora Welty, Emmett Till, William Faulkner, Medgar Evers, Richard Wright, Tennessee Williams…and the celebrated Delta Jewels church mothers. Come sit a spell and hear the revered voices of these living figures of history captured by Alysia Burton Steele.
Speakers Expertise:
Alysia Burton Steele is a visual educator at the University of Mississippi, with a focus on oral history and visuals. For this presentation, Steele shares her experiences finding and nurturing relationships to earn trust to collect stories and share them with audiences. She shares audio and video stores as part of her presentation.

*Presentation will take place in Room 215 of the Academic Complex

"Baltimore" Performance & Discussion
2019-03-25 | Delta State University, 1003 W Sunflower Rd, Cleveland, MS, 38733, United States

DSU's Winning the Race Conference 2019
2019-03-25 - 2019-03-26 | Delta State University, 1003 W Sunflower Rd, Cleveland, MS, 38733, United States
The Winning the Race Conference was developed with three overarching goals: engage in conversations with campus and community constituencies that will build an appreciation for diversity differences and a spirit of community through shared ideas; promote a broad discourse on race relations by building conversations to bring together diverse communities in the Delta through sharing of ideas and building cooperation; and to rekindle a hope that Delta communities will move toward greater equality and forward and open thinking while reducing racial disparities and tensions.

Representing the Experiences of Women: Women in Mississippi Politics
2019-03-25 17:30 - 19:00 | Hardy Hall Ballroom, 730 East Beach Blvd., Long Beach, MS, 39560
The University of Southern Mississippi Gulf Park Campus premieres its spring 2019 Cultural Arts Series, “Representing the Experiences of Women, From the English Renaissance to Right Now.”
On March 25, a bi-partisan panel of female politicians from south Mississippi will reflect on their careers in local and state politics.
“The theme, ‘Representing the Experiences of Women, From the English Renaissance to Right Now,’ was prompted by the #MeToo movement and an unprecedented increase in the number of women who ran for—and were elected to—local, state, and national offices in the midterm elections of 2018,” said Dr. Christopher D. Foley, event organizer and assistant professor of English.
“In the midst of these important movements in gender politics and society more widely, we aim to foster community engagement and civil dialogue regarding the changing roles of women in society today. We hope the public will join us for the conversation.”

Shange's Sojourn: Women, Art, & Activism
2019-03-26 10:00 - 17:00 | Jackson State University, 1400 J.R. Lynch Street, Jackson, MS, 39217
“Shange’s Sojourn: ‘Somebody almost walked off with alla my stuff!’ Women, Art, & Activism” is a celebration of Women’s History Month recognizing Ntozake Shange’s legacy as established bby the release and reception of her choreopoem for colored girls who have considered suicide/when the rainbow is enuf.
The March 26 program will include a full day of activities on the JSU campus. It will begin with a theatrical production of exceprts from for colored girls…with both student and community actors. Afterward, there will be a Q&A session with the actors and director. Later, a panel of scholars from Jackson State and Tougaloo will discuss women, art, and activism. The discussion will be followed by an Artists’ Lounge that will feature local poets and visual artist presenting and discussing their work. The day will conclude with a student open mic event.

The Twenty-Sixth Oxford Conference for the Book
2019-03-27 - 2019-03-29 | Various Locations in Oxford; Visit Website for More Information, 38655
Founded by the Center for the Study of Southern Culture and Square Books, the conference brings together fiction and nonfiction writers, journalists, artists, poets, publishers, teachers, students, and literacy advocates for three days of conversation in the literary town of Oxford, Mississippi.
The 26th Oxford Conference for the Book will take place Wednesday, March 27 – Friday, March 29, 2019.
Please visit the Oxford Conference for the Book website to learn more.

SB: Rethinking Mass Incarceration for a Better Way Forward
2019-04-01 18:00 - 19:00 | Hines Hall Auditorium, 101 Cunningham Blvd., Booneville, MS, 38829
This presentation consists of a brief introduction of the current state of incarceration in America and Mississippi. Dr. Pickett will then share with the audience the long history of incarceration in Mississippi beginning with the institution of slavery, the first jails in Natchez and Jackson, the black codes and the convict lease system in the late nineteenth century. He will then describe the shift in the state’s history for prison reform to penitentiaries like Parchman at the turn of the twentieth century. Finally, he will examine incarceration and punishment through the Jim Crow era and the use of lynching, imprisonment during the Civil Rights movement and the modern day situation of private, for-profit prisons in Mississippi. He will then provide examples of ways in which we can begin to, as a society, rethink the prison space through discussing the creation and founding of the Prison to College Pipeline program. He will demonstrate that providing small investments in education has tremendous results in reducing recidivism, enhancing re-entry and lowering the violence level of incarcerated spaces. Introducing a humanities-driven curriculum meant to encourage, inspire and to bring hope and dignity to incarcerated men and women across the state will help this continue.
Speakers Expertise:
Dr. Pickett holds a Ph.D. in U.S. history from the University of Mississippi and has taught history courses at the University of Mississippi and Mississippi College, which included the institution of slavery, the convict lease system and the modern carceral state. He has also taught courses on the history and literature of the Civil Rights Movement at Parchman Mississippi State Penitentiary and the Central Correctional Facility.

Behind the Big House
2019-04-04 - 2019-04-06 | Hugh Craft House, 184 S. Memphis St., Holly Springs, MS, 38635
The Behind The Big House Tour is uncovering the truth about slavery in antebellum Holly Springs. Re-enactors channel the lives of enslaved people in the houses where they actually lived. They demonstrate the labor of slaves in the kitchen, the yard, and the big house.

For All the World to See: Visual Culture and the Struggle for Civil Rights
2019-04-04 17:00 - 19:00 | Museum of the Mississippi Delta, 1608 Hwy 82 West, Greenwood, MS, 38930
The Museum of the Mississippi Delta is hosting the traveling exhibit “For All the World to See: Visual Culture and Struggle for Civil Rights,” with an opening cocktail reception on Thursday, April 4. This exhibition examines the role visual culture played in shaping and transforming the struggle for racial equality in America from the late 1940s to the mid-1970s. The exhibit is not a history of the Civil Rights Movement itself, but rather an exploration of the vast number of potent images that have influenced how Americans perceived race and the struggle for equality.
Museum members admitted free, non-member tickets are $10.00

MHC Public Humanities Awards and Gala
2019-04-05 17:30 - 20:00 | Old Capitol Museum, 100 South State Street, Jackson , MS, 39201
The Mississippi Humanities Council will hold its Public Humanities Awards and Gala April 5, 2019, at the Old Capitol Museum in Jackson. The awards recognize outstanding work by Mississippians in bringing the insights of the humanities to public audiences.
Help celebrate awardees Patti Carr Black, Winterville Mounds, Mississippi Today, Dr. Stephanie Clanton Rolph, Dr. Brinda Fuller Willis, and our 32 Humanities Teacher Award winners by purchasing a ticket or sponsorship here: http://mshumanities.org/program/public-humanities-awards/
Thank you to our event sponsors Trustmark, Entergy Mississippi, and BancorpSouth for their generous financial support.

Let the World See What I've Seen
2019-04-06 09:00 - 12:00 | Museum of the Mississippi Delta, 1608 Hwy 82 West, Greenwood, MS, 38930
The murder of Emmett Till remains fresh in our memory as evidenced by recent articles in the Clarion Ledger by a variety of authors particularly since the reopening of the case by the U.S. Attorney General. Patrick Weems of the Emmett Till Interpretive Center will facilitate the panel discussion that will include: 1) Devery S. Anderson, author of Emmett Till: The Murder That Shocked the World and Propelled the Civil Rights Move; 2) Dave Tell, from the University of Kansas, will present on his Emmett Till Memory Project and 3) Wheeler Parker, Till’s cousin who was with him at the time of his abduction.

"Mississippi Justice" Film Screening and Panel
2019-04-08 17:00 - 19:00 | MC Law CNS Building, 151 E. Griffith Street, Jackson, MS, 39201
NMHS Unlimited Productions and the Mississippi Humanities Council present the documentary film “Mississippi Justice,” a film based on actual events that occurred in Pike County, Mississippi in 1951. This event is free and open to the public.
Based on documented records, the film centers around a 20-year-old black female, Hattie Lee Barnes, with only a fourth-grade education, who shot and killed a young blue-eyed, six-foot-tall white male from a local prominent family. At the time the newest and youngest attorney in Pike County, Joe Pigott, was appointed as her public defender. In 20 days, Hattie Lee Barnes was served an indictment, entered a not guilty plea, and was on trial for murder.
After the film is shown, a panel will discuss the judicial and social environment during that period in Mississippi history and how it relates to the issues of today. Panel members will include City of Jackson Municipal Judge June Hardwick; Attorney Brad Pigott, son of the late Justice Joe Pigott; Judge Patricia Wise, retired Hinds County Chancery Court Judge; and Dr. Wilma Mosley Clopton, filmmaker.

"Mississippi Justice" Film Screening and Panel
2019-04-09 16:00 - 18:00 | Jackson State University, 1400 J.R. Lynch Street, Jackson, MS, 39217
NMHS Unlimited Productions and the Mississippi Humanities Council present the documentary film “Mississippi Justice,” a film based on actual events that occurred in Pike County, Mississippi in 1951. This event is free and open to the public.
Based on documented records, the film centers around a 20-year-old black female, Hattie Lee Barnes, with only a fourth-grade education, who shot and killed a young blue-eyed, six-foot-tall white male from a local prominent family. At the time the newest and youngest attorney in Pike County, Joe Pigott, was appointed as her public defender. In 20 days, Hattie Lee Barnes was served an indictment, entered a not guilty plea, and was on trial for murder.
After the film is shown, a panel will discuss the judicial and social environment during that period in Mississippi history and how it relates to the issues of today. Panel members will include City of Jackson Municipal Judge June Hardwick; Attorney Brad Pigott, son of the late Justice Joe Pigott; Judge Patricia Wise, retired Hinds County Chancery Court Judge; and Dr. Wilma Mosley Clopton, filmmaker.
Event will take place in room 100 of the Charles F. Moore building

2019 Sammy O. Cranford Memorial History Lecture
2019-04-11 19:00 - 20:00 | Delta State University, 1003 W Sunflower Rd, Cleveland, MS, 38733, United States
The 2019 annual Sammy O. Craford Memorial History Lecture will take place Thursday, April 11. This year, Dr. Joseph Crespino (Jimmy Carter Professor of American History at Emory University) will deliver a presentation entitled “Atticus Finch: The Biography.”
The lecture will take place at 7pm in the Jobe Hall Auditorium on the DSU campus.

Everywhere with Roy Lewis
2019-04-12 16:00 - 17:00 | Jackson State University, 1400 J.R. Lynch Street, Jackson, MS, 39217
The Margaret Walker Center presents the photography exhibition Everywhere with Roy Lewis as part of its 13th annual student conference at Jackson State University. Roy Lewis has been a celebrated black photographer for the past 50 years, who photographed many of the iconic moments of the modern civil rights movement and was often invited by Dr. Margaret Walker Alexander to photograph the events she hosted at Jackson State.
There will be an opening gallery talk and reception with Roy Lewis himself in the Johnson Hall Art Gallery at JSU, where the exhibition will be installed on Friday, April 12. There will also be a public conversation on Thursday, June 6, in Johnson Hall with Mark Geil, Associate Professor of Art, whose work focuses on photography, and Redell Hearn, Curator of Art and Civil Rights for Tougaloo College and the Mississippi Museum of Art.
The exhibition will run at Jackson State from April 12 to June 28, 2019.

SB: Robert Johnson at the Crossroads
2019-04-12 18:00 - 19:00 | Lee County Library, 219 N. Madison Street, Tupelo, MS, 38804
In colorful costume,storytellers Rebecca Jernigan and Wendy Garrison retell the tale of legendary bluesman Robert Johnson. With music, drama and sign language, they recount his fateful encounter with the Prince of Darkness at the crossroads in the Delta. In educational venues they stress that the audience is integral to any live performance. They discuss the historical person Robert Johnson, and they share the role of the blues as an indigenous musical genre that grew out of the challenges of life in the Mississippi delta.
Speakers Expertise:
Wendy Garrison is an Oxford, MS, slide guitar player profiled on the Mississippi Arts Commission’s Folk Life and Folk Artist Directory.
