Video: Rising Appalachia | Resilient
These times are poignant
The winds have shifted
It’s all we can do
To stay uplifted
Adrian Blevins: Appalachians Run Amok
I’m impatient like you to get to the bottom of the problem
of what to call the vacant feeling of our long-ago deportation
from the goats & their creamy milk & the meadows & pastures
they would frolic in each Sunday when my father would
metaphorically herd them…
Mason Adams: Appalachia’s Deep History of Resistance
Protest runs through the region’s veins like coal seams through the mountains.
Michael Simms: Oh Darlin’
The intimacy
Of strangers is luminous, the way
We wish well for the man who lost
His car keys, the woman coming in
Out of the rain, the girl who missed
Her bus, the boy who stutters.
Jason Baldinger: Résumé
apparently just to live
just to experience life
is not an acceptable trade
Erica Etelson: How Liberals Left the White Working Class Behind
While people of color and middle-class White women are slowly gaining representation, poor Whites’ stars are not rising.
Jason Baldinger: A Seventy-Four Dollar Shotgun
two men in camouflage
drunk loud talk, stare at shotguns
Elizabeth Romero: Being Poor
It can be waiting
And telling your children to wait
Wait their whole childhoods away.
It’s knowing they blame you.
James Zogby: Addressing Those Who Have Been Fooled All of the Time
What is needed is a message that speaks to voters across the spectrum, telling them that they are being heard and their needs will be addressed by proposals for economic and social progress that will include and benefit everyone.
Jay Carson: Michael
On his route with a load of papers on his head,
he wasn’t tough enough to scare Michael
who socked him so hard papers flew
like peace doves all over Fifth Avenue.
Video: Nora Brown plays two old-time banjo tunes
In a mesmerizing set, musician Nora Brown breathes new life into two old-time banjo tunes: “East Virginia” and “John Brown’s Dream.” An evocative performance paired with a quick history of the banjo’s evolution.
Niaz Dorry: Rural America Is Reeling. What’s the Remedy?
While the U.S. government has prioritized the bailout of Wall Street with public monies, it has marginalized distressed rural communities and failed to provide the necessary funds, expertise and assistance to help revitalize them.
Sherry Hamby: Resisting technology, Appalachian style
When people hear “Appalachia,” stereotypes and even slurs often immediately jump to mind, words like “backwards,” “ignorant,” “hillbilly” or “yokel.” But Appalachian attitudes about technology’s role in daily life are … Continue reading
John Samuel Tieman: A Billboard Not Outside Ebbing, Missouri
A few years ago, my wife and I were driving in Franklin County, Missouri. I saw something off the road, and excitedly said to her, “Honey, look — look at … Continue reading
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