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Comicana Explores Broad Range of Real-World Issues

Posted on: October 8th, 2019 by erabadie

Weeklong UM event focuses on the role of comics and graphic novels in exploring weighty subjects

Comicana

OCTOBER 8, 2019 BY TRISTEN BLOXSOM

A number of University of Mississippi departments have teamed up for Comicana, which runs through Saturday (Oct. 12) on campus, focusing on the role of comics and graphic novels in offering insight into questions literature often doesn’t answer.

The departments of Art and Art History, Classics, English, Philosophy and Religion, and Writing and Rhetoric worked together to create the weeklong interdisciplinary conference. Comicana features readings of graphic novels and comics across the humanities.

It includes workshops, exhibitions at the J.D. Williams Library and Gallery 130, and guest speakers. The events are free and open to the public, and the majority of events are slated for Bryant Hall.

Despite what people already think about graphic novels and comics, the literature chosen to be discussed at Comicana will analyze more serious topics such as religion, gender roles, sexism and poverty, organizers said.

“The predetermined image of comics and graphic novels have limited people to see what these sequential arts have to offer,” said Mary Thurlkill, professor of religion. “I hope that this convention will bring awareness of these topics and bring more people into the world of sequential arts.”

Kris Belden-Adams, associate professor of art history, worked to organize the conference and helped get students involved. She hopes the event will create a wide-ranging conversation for the community.

“It’s great for us to leave campus and connect with the community, and I don’t think we do that enough,” Belden-Adams said. “I think this event will help us make that much-needed connection with the community.”

Thurlkill was inspired to organize a comic conference on campus, and she brought in Belden-Adams; Lauren Cardenas; assistant professor of printmaking; and Wendy Goldberg, core instructor in the Department of Writing and Rhetoric, to help put it together. Thurlkill also secured funding from the Mississippi Humanities Council.

“I think it’s important to show how comics are important throughout this community,” Belden-Adams said. “They are a way to bring all the departments together, and this conference gives a familiar place for people and gives them a more scholarly look into the comic community.”

All the organizers share the same passion about bringing awareness of the comic world to the Oxford community and want to encourage people to think more critically about controversial topics.

Cardenas hopes those who attend will begin to view comics as more than just entertainment, and that it will bridge some gaps between the humanities and the different discourses within them.

“Comics provide an interesting connection to humanities and when put through the lens of the comics, it helps people think more critically,” Cardenas said. “Looking at these topics from a variety of lenses – like a feminist lens, an LBGTQ lens or through a more contemporary culture lens – will help show how the dynamics of these topics have started to change.”

Cardenas created a student panel, made up of five Ole Miss undergraduate and graduate students, to help with Comicana in hopes of bringing student awareness to the event.

“I hope this event gets traction for the comics discussed and I think if it gets traction, it will gain traction with the student body,” Cardenas said.

For a full schedule and more information about Comicana, go to https://egrove.olemiss.edu/comicana/2019/.

Oxford Conference for the Book Welcomes Authors for 26th Year

Posted on: March 5th, 2019 by erabadie

Readings, panel discussions and lectures are free and open to the public

MARCH 4, 2019 BY REBECCA LAUCK CLEARY

The 26th annual Oxford Conference for the Book is set for March 27-29 at the University of Mississippi.

What do a championship poker player, the U.S.-Mexico border controversy and the Appalachian South have in common? They are all part of this year’s Oxford Conference for the Book, set for March 27-29 at the University of Mississippi.

The 26th annual event is a mixture of authors, editors, historians and scholars who are interested in the written word.

The longest-running event put on by the UM Center for the Study of Southern Culture is free and open to the public. The only exception is the March 27 opening reception featuring music, food, drinks and conversations with conference attendees and guest authors at Memory House, 406 University Ave. Tickets are $50 and are available online.

At 11:30 a.m. that day, Travis McDade, author of “Torn From their Bindings: A Story of Art, Science, and the Pillaging of American University Libraries,” gives the keynote lecture after a free luncheon sponsored by the Friends of the Library in the Faulkner Room in the Department of Archives and Special Collections at the J.D. Williams Library. The lunch begins at 11 a.m. and reservations are required.

“I’m beyond pleased with how well this conference coordinates across the campus with various organizations, departments and institutions,” conference director James G. Thomas Jr. said. “The opening lunch, sponsored by the Friends of the Library, is a great example of this conference’s commitment to partnering with our friends – old and new – on campus and in Oxford.”

New to the conference this year is a partnership with the Department of Philosophy and Religion, Department of Psychology, Sally McDonnell Barksdale Honors College and the Ole Miss Student Union to bring author, professional speaker, decision strategist and former professional poker player Annie Duke for the “Making Smarter Decisions When You Don’t Have All the Facts” panel, set for 4 p.m. March 28 in the Overby Center for Southern Journalism and Politics.

The philosophy department teaches many courses in logic, and professor Neil Manson teaches common statistical fallacies in connection with probability theory in his courses.

“Still, there is only so much excitement a professor can convey in a classroom, and the material can seem remote,” Manson said. “Having a world-class poker player – someone who has literally made millions of dollars based on her deep knowledge of the very material we cover – will definitely make the ideas in probability, statistics, and psychology come alive for our students.

“It also helps that she’s a great writer with lots of down-to-earth examples and stories, not to mention that she nearly won ‘Celebrity Apprentice’ 10 years ago, which is pretty awesome.”

All Ole Miss students are invited to a reception for Duke at 12:15 p.m. March 28in the Sally McDonnell Barksdale Honors College.

As in years past, “Thacker Mountain Radio Hour” will host a special Oxford Conference for the Book show with Leanne Shapton, author of “Guestbook: Ghost Stories,” and Ken Wells, author of “Gumbo Life: Tales from the Roux Bayou,” at 6 p.m. March 28 at the Lyric Theatre, at 1006 Van Buren Ave., just off the Oxford Square.

At 8 p.m. at the Powerhouse Community Arts Center, SouthDocs filmmaker Rex Jones will screen his film “La Frontera” with Mark Hainds, author of “Border Walk.” Both the film and book document Haind’s 1,000-mile walk along the entire stretch of the U.S.-Mexican border.

Other conference participants include Edmund White; Ralph Eubanks and Dennis Covington; Jessica Wilkerson with Karida Brown, Elizabeth Catte and Meredith McCarroll discussing the Appalachian region; Jason Berry; David Blight; Kiese Laymon; Wright Thompson with his editor Scott Moyers; Salvatore Scibona; and David Zurick.

At 1:15 p.m. March 29, William Boyle, UM adjunct instructor in writing and rhetoric, moderates a panel titled “On the Fringes of Noir,” with authors Willy Vlautin, Elle Nash and Gabino Iglesias. The panel is unified by Dennis Lehane’s definition of noir as “working-class tragedy,” Boyle said.

“Willy is my favorite novelist and songwriter, so I knew he’d be the first writer I’d invite,” Boyle said. “He’s rarely, if ever, identified as a noir writer, but he works the edges of the genre in some really interesting ways.

“From there, I thought it’d be great to invite a couple of other young writers who work the edges of the genre in varying ways.”

The Children’s Book Festival is held in conjunction with the OCB on March 29 at the Gertrude C. Ford Center for the Performing Arts, with more than 1,200 first- and fifth-graders from Oxford and Lafayette County schools in attendance, all of whom receive their own copy of their grade’s book.

Dan Santat will talk to first-graders at 9 a.m. about his book “After the Fall: (How Humpty Dumpty Got Back Up Again),” sponsored by the Lafayette County Literacy Council. Sharon Draper, sponsored by the Junior Auxiliary of Oxford, will talk to fifth-graders at 10:30 a.m. about “Out of My Mind.”

The Oxford Conference for the Book is sponsored by the Center for the Study of Southern Culture, Square Books, Lafayette County Literacy Council, J.D. Williams Library, Friends of the J.D. Williams Library, Overby Center for Southern Journalism and Politics, Junior Auxiliary of Oxford and the Lafayette County and Oxford Public Library. The conference is partially funded by the university, a contribution from the R&B Feder Foundation for the Beaux Arts, a grant from the Mississippi Humanities Council and promotional support from Visit Oxford.

For a full schedule and more information, visit http://www.oxfordconferenceforthebook.com and the conference’s Facebook page. Register for special events on the conference website or by contacting conference director James Thomas Jr. at 662-915-3374 or by email at jgthomas@olemiss.edu.

Jimmy Thomas: Influencing Writing Through Southern Culture

Posted on: August 31st, 2015 by erabadie

By Ellen Whitaker | Courtesy of The Daily Mississippian Rebel Guide: Orientation 2015

Jimmy Thomas | Photo by Ellen Whitaker

Wander through the maze of Barnard Observatory, past multiple rows of dark wood bookcases, and begin at the base of the curved stairwell, not the main one, but the one off to the right. Climb two sets of pre-Civil War stair- wells and land in Jimmy Thomas’ office. Seriously, land in it—no door, no office number, no secretary answering a phone. Just look up and be greeted by a light-infused circular room and a soft, friendly smile from Thomas himself.

Thomas is the associate director for publications at the Center for the Study of Southern Culture, located in the east wing of Barnard Observatory on the University of Mississippi campus. Thomas has not only worked for the Center since 2003, but he also is an adjunct professor in the Department of Writing and Rhetoric.

“I came on board to work on the New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture,” Thomas said. “It is a 24-volume encyclopedia ranging from everything from religion in the South to race. It includes things like art and architecture, language, ethnicity, literature, the environment and so on. I originally came on as a project manager, and we would publish about four a year.”

Ted Ownby, director of the Center for the Study of Southern Culture, said that Thomas’ knack for making sure that the encyclopedias were published on time was impressive. “First of all, Jimmy is a really good editor,” Ownby said. “He is extraordinary with deadlines. I think 23 of the 24 volumes of the New Encyclopedia came out on time. I think that is virtually unheard of in academic publishing history. So, he holds up to those standards, that no, we do not publish roughly on time—we publish on time.”

Thomas grew up in the Mississippi Delta, specifically Leland and Greenville, and graduated from UM with a bachelor’s degree in English and philosophy in 1994 and a master’s degree in Southern Studies in 2007. After finishing his master’s, Thomas began teaching Liberal Arts 102, which is an alternative to Writing 102 and is offered through the Department of Writing and Rhetoric. LIBA 102, a first-year seminar, is only available for freshmen students to take after they have completed a 101 writing course.

Thomas said that the advantage of taking LIBA 102 instead of Writing 102 is that students would be taking a research writing course from an expert in that subject, whether it is Southern Studies or even engineering.

Sara Seckman, senior communication sciences and disorders major from Atlanta, took Thomas’ class in the spring of her freshman year. “I was told that LIBA classes were a fun alternative to writing courses,” Seckman said. “I saw that the subject was Southern Studies and thought that it would be cool. We are Ole Miss, and I feel like it is the epicenter of Southern studies.”

Seckman said that Thomas is her favorite professor at UM.

“He was the first professor in college that just made me feel like that I could do it, like I could conquer the class,” Seckman said. “I really got into my final research project, because I enjoyed the class so much. He just made me feel like a great student. He is passionate about what he does, and it really comes out in his teaching.”

In Thomas’ research writing class, each student writes three research papers—two shorter papers and one eight- to 10-page paper. For the final project, students pick an iconic Southern person, place, thing or event and write about it.

“I chose to write about voodoo in New Orleans for my final project,” Seckman said. “I called some shops down there and had these crazy conversations with some crazy people that I would have never talked to before. He gave us free rein and let us get creative with it.”

Getting the students to be engaged intellectually and to care about the subject that they are writing about is how Thomas said he influences his students’ greater understanding of writing.

“If you are interested in the topic, if you want to know more about it, then you are going to do better,” Thomas said. “But getting them to care about language—the way we communicate—is a big challenge. But if you can do that, then you are kind of there.”

Thomas said that his favorite parts about teaching are getting to know the students and watching them improve their writing over the course of the semester.

“They do not have to be Faulkner when they walk out of my class, but if they can walk out of the class and feel like they have accomplished something, then that makes it worthwhile.”