Mississippi

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• SOURCE: Skipped History
  10/15/2020
  

  How Mississippi Got Away with Teaching Racist History (Skipped History)

  It took litigation to drag Mississippi's history instruction out of the Lost Cause mythology. 

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• SOURCE: The Bitter Southerner
  10/14/2020
  

  Premiere: Mississippi Justice

  The Bitter Southerner magazine and PBS's The American Experience partner on a short film that examines the plot to murder the civil rights workers Andrew Goodman, James Chaney and Michael Schwerner in 1964. 

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• SOURCE: Iowa Public Radio
  9/23/2020
  

  “The White Man Who Stayed” Tells A Story Of Activism During The Civil Rights Era (audio)

  Poet James Autry's newest book tells the story of his cousin, a white man who remained in Mississippi as a liberal advocate for integration and justice. 

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• SOURCE: Mississippi Clarion-Ledger
  9/16/2020
  

  State Auditor Investigating Ole Miss Professor Who Participated In Strike

  A controversial sociologist at the University of Mississippi has drawn attention from the state auditor for participation in the #ScholarStrike protest movement. 

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• SOURCE: Mississippi Free Press
  9/3/2020
  

  Good Trouble’ In A White Flight Suburb: Oak Grove High Teens Confront Racism

  by Ashton Pittman

  Black Lives Matter protests organized by high school students near Hattiesburg, Mississippi are responding to inequities created by the growth of white flight suburbs after "Brown v. Board of Education," when manipulated city and school district boundaries and private "segregation academies" helped whites to hoard resources and educational opportunity.

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• SOURCE: Smithsonian
  8/18/2020
  

  Fannie Lou Hamer Risked Her Life for the Right to Vote

  Fannie Lou Hamer suffered unspeakable violence and intimidation at the hands of white supremacists and police to demand the right to vote, and challenged the Democratic Party to reject its southern segregationist branch in 1964.

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• SOURCE: Smithsonian
  8/20/2020
  

  Fannie Lou Hamer’s Dauntless Fight for Black Americans’ Right to Vote

  by Keisha N. Blain

  As Hamer and her Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party colleagues pointed out to the 1964 Democratic National Convention, a “whites-only” Democratic Party representing a state in which one out of five residents were black undermined the very notion of representative democracy. 

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• 8/2/2020
  

  The Mississippi Flag and the Shadow of Lynching

  by David T.Z. Mindich

  Lynching helped to raise the odious flag in 1894.  But in 2020, hundreds of thousands of marchers protesting the lynching of George Floyd brought the flag down. 

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• SOURCE: CNN
  7/1/2020
  

  Mississippi Changing Its Flag Isn't the End of Confederate Symbols in State Flags

  "For the first third of our nation's history, from about 1777 to 1861, it was almost unheard of for individual Americans to fly the flag," says historian Marc Leepson.

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• 6/30/2020
  

  Mississippi to Remove Confederate Insignia from State Flag

  Historians discuss the bipartisan vote and the path forward for the state of Mississippi. 

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• SOURCE: NPR
  6/30/2020
  

  Mississippi Governor Signs Law Removing Confederate Design From State Flag

  "People who wanted to keep the flag couldn't ignore what it meant anymore," says Democratic state Rep. Robert Johnson, the minority leader in the Mississippi House.

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• SOURCE: Washington Post
  6/28/2020
  

  Mississippi House and Senate Vote to Remove Confederate Icon from State Flag

  “In the name of history, I stand for my two sons who are 1 and 6 years old,” said Sen. Derrick Simmons (D), who is black. “Who should be educated in schools, be able to frequent businesses and express their black voices in public spaces that all fly a symbol of love, not hate. A symbol of unity, not division. A symbol that represents all Mississippians, not some.”

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• SOURCE: WAPT
  6/28/2020
  

  Millsaps History Professor Explains History Behind Mississippi State Flag

  Professor Stephanie Rolph says that lawmakers in 1894 chose the design to appease Confederate veterans.

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• SOURCE: Vanity Fair
  6/23/2020
  

  “There Is No Excuse”: University of Mississippi Faculty Members Condemn Proposed “Shrine to White Supremacy”

  by Kiese Laymon

  For years members of the community have fought state legislators to have a Confederate statue removed. Faculty are releasing this statement in response to new plans for the memorial that would include its move to a newly renovated cemetery, “a shrine to white supremacy,” as one staff member and signatory puts it.

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• SOURCE: Mississippi Free Press
  6/11/2020
  

  ‘You White People Don’t Get It’: Mississippi’s Long, Ugly Road To Changing Its State Flag

  Four years before the state adopted a flag design with the confederate emblem in the top left corner, Mississippi made radical changes to its Constitution which deliberately targeted Black residents and reversed Reconstruction-era reforms.

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• SOURCE: Mississippi Today
  6/9/2020
  

  Bipartisan Group of Lawmakers, with Speaker Gunn’s Blessing, Pushes to Change Mississippi State Flag

  The current state flag was adopted in 1894 and is the last in the nation containing the Confederate battle emblem.

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• 6/7/2020
  

  "I Imagine Everything Happened on Beale Street": Remembering Memphis in "Brother Robert"

  by Annye C. Anderson and Preston Lauterbach

  In an excerpt from the new book Brother Robert, Annye Anderson, sister of blues legend Robert Johnson, describes time spent with Johnson in Memphis, and the trends in music, movies, and black politics that shaped Johnson's personality as well as his innovative music.

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• SOURCE: Vanity Fair
  5/20/2020
  

  Exclusive First Look at New Photograph of Blues Legend Robert Johnson

  Even if he didn’t sell his soul at the Crossroads, the massively influential Mississippi guitarist remains shrouded in mystery. An upcoming memoir from his 94-year-old stepsister brings new depth to Johnson’s mythos—and the third verified picture of him in existence.

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• 1/26/20
  

  “Who’s Responsible For What’s Happening at Parchman?": A Historical Analysis of Mississippi’s Prisons

  by Michael Murphy

  These recent deaths at Parchman have a long historical tradition in Mississippi state-run institutions and are linked to underfunding and lack of support by the state government.

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• SOURCE: The Chronicle of Higher Education
  11/8/19
  

  The Trouble With ‘Ole Miss’

  by Marc Parry

  The U. of Mississippi has distanced itself from much of its Confederate past. Will it ever do the same with its popular nickname?