Appalachia in the Classroom:  Teaching the Region, Ed. Patricia Gantt.

(contributing author, Ohio University Press, forthcoming)

“My students find themselves in a time of real flux, poised at the intersection of the past and the present. While my students—many of them first-generation college students—deservedly look forward to greater economic advantages than their parents and grandparents enjoyed, they and their home communities would benefit from their ability to maintain rich connections to family and place. Yet many of them do not perceive the value of remaining connected to the past or to the place that has been home, and the faculty who teach them face the key challenge of showing these students that being Appalachian is not a limitation, as many outside the region would have them believe, but a real source of groundedness in a rapidly changing world.”

“Appalachian Literature”

A Companion to the Literature and Culture of the American South, Ed. Richard Gray and Owen Robinson

(contributing author, Blackwell)

“At the heart of this outpouring of creativity from Appalachian writers is a lively community, a kind of ongoing oral tradition delivered via the written word…. [A]ll of the current outpouring of the written word in Appalachia calls the reader back to mountain folklore, ballads, Jack tales, and simple storytelling on the front porch…. Ultimately, for all true Appalachian writers, the task has been to claim the literature for themselves, to make the magic of the written word give voice to the power of the voice on the wind, the song in the holler.”

“A Second Southern Renaissance”

The History of Southern Women’s Literature, Ed. Carolyn Perry and Mary Louise Weaks

(contributing author, Louisiana State University Press)

“This second southern renaissance is not a movement of the wealthy, landed aristocratic South…. Rather, this renaissance is the full and unfettered outpouring of multiple voices in the region: African Americans, Native Americans, poor whites, lesbians, mountain folk, the invisible and disenfranchised claiming their own rightful space in the region, the silenced telling their own stories.”

Entries on Hazel Dickens, Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Rita Sims Quillen and Lee Smith

Encyclopedia of Appalachia

(contributor, University of Tennessee Press)

“Researched and developed by the Center for Appalachian Studies and Services at East Tennessee State University, this 1,860-page compendium includes all thirteen states that constitute the northern, central, and southern subregions of Appalachia—from New York to Mississippi. With thorough, detailed, yet accessible entries on everything from Adventists to zinc mining, the Encyclopedia of Appalachia is an indispensable one-stop guide to all things Appalachian.”

Entries on “Hazel Dickens” and “Henry Louis Gates, Jr.”

The West Virginia Encyclopedia

(contributor, West Virginia Humanities Council)

“Working under the slogan, ‘All there is to know about West Virginia,’ the editors packed 2,200 articles into the pages of this big book. The West Virginia Encyclopedia is the state's first comprehensive, one-volume reference book in many decades. Both entertaining and authoritative, The West Virginia Encyclopedia is the place to learn more about West Virginia.”

Clips of the essays and articles are available upon request. Information about other essays and articles is available upon request as well.