At first glance John Sanderson’s series of images, entitled Carbon County, has the familiar cadence of American Western documentary photography. Broad sweeping landscapes with horizons that seem worlds away, lonely snaking roads and rugged men on horseback. But very quickly these perceived pillars of American Western identity, the keystones in the story we tell ourselves […]
Harvey Stein: Mexico Between Life and Death
I don’t believe there is a better way to get to know a place than by traveling on foot, especially in a place as rich and full of life as Mexico. How else would you expect to happen upon a swirling crowd of dancers, or a child sound asleep on the shelves of a market […]
Southbound: Photographs of and about the New South, Day 7
On our final day of posts for Southbound: Photographs of and about the New South, we feature a selection of the co-curators Mark Sloan and Mark Long’s essay on emplacing the new south. I think that there is no better text to summarize the exploration of Southern identity and culture that we’ve featured throughout the […]
Southbound: Photographs of and about the New South, Day 6
In addition to an amazing curation of Southern photography and writing, Southbound also features an incredible interactive map depicting concentrations of everything from African Americans to chickens, confederate symbols to field crops, as well as an “Index of Southernness”. This index was created by fusing the other maps presented, showcasing “classic regional geographic patterns of core, […]
Southbound: Photographs of and about the New South, Day 5
We are continuing our feature of images and text from Southbound: Photographs of and about the New South today, with an essay by author, editor, and southern food aficionado John T. Edge. John T. Edge writes about the American South. The Penguin Press published his latest book, The Potlikker Papers: A Food History of the Modern South, named a […]
Southbound: Photographs of and about the New South, Day 4
For the fourth day of our weeklong feature of images and text from Southbound: Photographs of and about the New South, the photographs are accompanied by an essay by historian, author, film-maker, and all around expert on the South, William Ferris. William R. Ferris is a professor of history at UNC–Chapel Hill and an adjunct professor […]