Take On The South

Mark Smith is joined by Matt Childs, professor of history at the University of South Carolina, to discuss the longstanding connections between the South, Latin America, and the Caribbean. They discuss shared cultural practices, economic realities, and histories and the idea that, in some ways, the South has always been akin to the more southerly parts of the Americas than the US North. Childs argues that, in order to understand the South as more than simply "the place that is not the North," we need to place the region into hemispheric and global contexts, looking for places of interconnection that transcend national borders.

Mark Smith talks to Southern Studies alumna Emily Ames (University of South Carolina class of '23) about her senior thesis: an examination of nearly 50 years of recipes in Southern Living magazine. How do these recipes, and their evolution over time, speak to how the South's ideas of itself and the region's place in America?

Jennifer Gunter spoke with the poet, Christian J. Collier. He is a Black, Southern writer, arts organizer, and teaching artist who resides in Chattanooga, Tennessee. His works have appeared in several journals and poetry reviews. A 2015 Loft Spoken Word Immersion Fellow, he is also the winner of the 2020 ProForma Contest and the 2019-2020 Seven Hills Review Poetry Contest. His most recent work The Gleaming of the Blade,  was named the 2021 Frost Place Competition Editors’ Selection.

They discussed the parameters of spoken word and the power of language.  Collier also talked about ways he uses race as a way at getting at a number of other issues such as intimacy and vulnerability. His take on the South is that we exist in a multitude of Souths, some not necessarily evident to all residents.

What does a South Carolina-born child understand about the South and Southern identity? Mark Smith is joined by his eight year old daughter, Rose, for an intriguing (and adorable) short interview that reveals much about how ideas such as "South" are put into larger social, pop cultural, and familial contexts as children begin the process of understanding their place in the world.

Dr. Mark Smith of the Institute for Southern Studies is joined by the  2023 McNair Conversation in Southern Studies Honoree, Lou Kennedy. Ms.  Kennedy is an alumna of the University of South Carolina and the CEO of  Nephron Pharmaceuticals. This discussion touches on economic  development, the doors a Southern accent opens, and the challenges faced  by women in business.  

The McNair Conversation is an annual event in which thinkers, leaders,  and just plain interested people from the South are interviewed about  their lives and how they understand the region. It is funded in part by a  generous grant from the estate of the late Robert McNair, governor of  South Carolina from 1965-1971.

Mark Smith is joined by Dr. Amy Snipes of Penn State to discuss the state of Latino farm labor in the South. What policies--both formal and informal--created the current reality of the South's agricultural sector being dominated by Latino labor? How does this echo previous eras of agricultural labor in the South? What current challenges are faced by Latino farm laborers? How do Southern cultural norms create a space in which Latinos feel comfortable doing seasonal farm labor in the South?

Professor Kent Germany of USC's History department steps in as a guest host to interview David Masciotra, author of I Am Somebody: Why Jesse Jackson Matters, about the life of the civil rights leader and Democratic party stalwart, and how Jackson's Southerness informed his work.

In January 1958, the Ku Klux Klan decided to hold a rally outside of the small town of Maxton, North Carolina. The goal was to intimidate local Native American groups and inscribe their place within the Jim Crow hierarchy--but when large numbers of armed Indians showed up, the plan backfired spectacularly.

Matt Simmons is joined by Judge James Lockemy, the recently-retired chief judge of the South Carolina Court of Appeals, to discuss the background, events, and aftermath of what is now remembered as the Battle of Hayes Pond, as well as the place of Native Americans, and particularly the Lumbee Indians of North Carolina, in the story of the South.

We're in the midst of bowl season, and we figure some of y'all are itching for even more football content--we're here for you! On today's episode, Mark Smith is joined by Andy Doyle, Associate Professor of history at Winthrop University to discuss the origins of college football in the South. How did this thoroughly industrialized, northeastern game associated with New England gentry and the Ivy League--which was originally rejected by Southerners as a "Yankee game"--come to dominate the region? It's a fascinating story full of colorful characters that you'll want to share with all of your football-loving friends and family.

This will be our last episode of 2022. We'll see y'all in the new year!

Mark Smith is joined by Ted Mauro, Chair of the South Carolina Advisory Committee to the US Commission on Civil Rights, to discuss the history and consequences of civil asset forfeiture in South Carolina.

From D.W. Griffith's The Birth of a Nation through this past summer's smash hit, Where the Crawdads Sing, the South has always been a key locale of Hollywood's vision of America. How does the region feature in America's cinematic imagination? How does Hollywood use the South, and how has the South on screen evolved over time? Matt Simmons is joined by a panel of guests today to discuss. You'll leave with a list of movies to watch!

An Englishman, a New Englander, and a Southerner walk into a podcast studio and have...a simply incredible conversation about the South, what ideas we bring to the region, and what we have to unlearn about it to make sense of it and ourselves within it. 

Matt Simmons is joined by Mark Smith and Andrew Berns, professor of history at the University of South Carolina, for an electric conversation. We could have gone on for three times as long!

Mark Smith is joined by Dr. Julius Fridriksson, the Vice President for Research at the University of South Carolina, to discuss the challenges and opportunities a major Southern university faces--and those it can help solve through research. Join us for this wide-ranging conversation about funding streams, the interactions of state and federal government agencies, modeling civil debate and engagement, science and the productivity of disagreement, and how the University of South Carolina's forthcoming new health sciences campus will position UofSC to be a national leader for years to come.

It's a story of moonshine, politics, Reconstruction, reform, populism, labor unrest, and rioting as we explore the history of the South Carolina State Constabulary and the development of state-level law enforcement in SC. Matt Simmons is joined by Mark Huguley, the mayor of Arcadia Lakes, SC, a retired SC law enforcement officer, and amateur historian for a fascinating and colorful conversation.

In the first episode of our new season, we think through how roads help to shape and define the South. In particular, we talk about "Malfunction Junction," South Carolina's most notorious highway interchange, the stretch of highway where I-20 and I-26 come together west of Columbia. What's the history of Malfunction Junction and what does that history tell us about the development of South Carolina over the last several generations? More importantly, what is its future as it transforms into "Carolina Crossroads" over the rest of this decade? Mark Smith is joined by Brian Klauk, project manager of the Carolina Crossroad projects, and Pete Poore, the communications director of the South Carolina Department of Transportation, to discuss.

https://www.scdotcarolinacrossroads.com/

In one of our most instructive episodes yet, Mark Smith is joined by Connie Schulz, Distinguished Professor Emerita of History at the University of South Carolina, for a fascinating conversation about her life and work. Along the way, we learn about the development of public history as an academic discipline, the evolution of how we study the role of women in our national history, and the differences between digital and analog editions of the papers of historical figures. Dr. Schulz also gives us an overview of the Pinckney family, one of the leading political dynasties of the Revolutionary and Early Republic periods, and explains how studying the personal papers of major historical figures also gives us insight into the lives of the otherwise lost-to-history individuals with whom they interacted. Finally, we're given a view into how historians work within and gather archival materials and how the all-important grants process works.

You're certain to learn a thing or two in this episode! Join us.

When Sean Dedmon, a 2022 graduate of the University of South Carolina, was looking for a project for his senior thesis, he decided to look through the archives of The Gamecock, UofSC's student newspaper. There, Sean found a debate about how students understood and memorialize the Civil War spanning five decades. The evolution of this debate parallels changes at the University and the state of South Carolina's place in broader national conversations. In this second of our summer special episodes, Mark Smith interviews Sean about his findings.

The political primary season is in full swing in the South, and Joshua Meyer-Gutbrod of UofSC's Political Science department joins Mark Smith to discuss in this first of a series of special summer episodes. 

Dr. Michael Woods, editor of the Andrew Jackson Papers project and professor of history at the University of Tennessee at Knoxville, joins Mark Smith to talk about the seventh president of the United States. How do lore and historical fact interact as we examine Jackson? What complexities about the man, his political circle, and the first third of the 19th century are revealed in his papers? Dr. Woods also discusses the process of editing this massive collection of papers and the challenges faced by Jackson's biographers.

https://thepapersofandrewjackson.utk.edu/

The South is home to some of the most economically dynamic cities and metropolitan areas in the country--but also a large number of places left behind by the ending of the previous economic order in the late 20th Century. Why do some Southern communities thrive while others lag? How do history, policy, and geography shape the economic fortunes of the South's small towns? And finally, what practical steps can be taken to help the South's small towns and rural areas thrive once again? Matt Simmons is joined by Jeremy Ward, a 2021 graduate of the University of South Carolina's economics department who is currently doing graduate work at Georgia Tech, to discuss these exact questions.