After years of writing, we’re down to the last few edits. We have a (mostly) completed and re-written manuscript, we have a draft out to some amazingly kind readers, we have the printing process nailed down, we have the press materials ready, and now we have the front cover (tentatively) designed. Since you’ve been popping […]
“The only way it’s ever going to change for us is if a poor person is elected president, and that isn’t going to happen.” How I See People Viewing Appalachia When elections roll around, I try to pay close attention to how people speak about Appalachia. I do that because I’m both interested in how […]
“Hello cousin Brad. Just letting you know that Dad died this morning. The last of that group of Bakers. Glad you got to visit. Love Connie.” I received the text at 9:33 pm last night as my wife and I sat on the couch watching television. I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to think […]
The difference between Bob and I was just a matter of degree. Our lives had taken on eerily similar trajectories. Yet an objective observer would have likely said my life was empirically better. The difference between my cousin and I was this: I carried a deep-seated shame that he didn’t know.
“You waking up hungover in jail is right up my alley. The rest of it sounds too academic.” That’s what Alex Heard said to me during our conversation after he finished reading my proposal. I can’t say I jumped for joy at that critique, but the conversation that followed helped me frame what I wanted […]
While I am happy at Ball State University, I have to give some love to my (graduate) alma mater, the University of California at Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism. All graduate programs are not created equal. Berkeley is an elite institution training (future) award-winning journalists who can tell stories across every medium. This is not […]
What is Appalachia? When I tell stories about my family and its relationship to Clay County, Kentucky and the County Seat of Manchester, people tend to think I exaggerate. You hear about poverty, feuds, grudges, anger at the government, lack of formal education, and a general desperation, but they don’t seem real.
I believe in science, but I spend almost no time reading the academic literature where the science of my craft (journalism) has traditionally been published. I spend even less time trying to craft research that would get published in those outlets. For most normal human beings, this is not a controversial stance. As a tenure-track […]
In 2009, the South by Southwest (SXSW) Interactive coordinators decided to carve out a corner of the conference where those people interested in start-ups, emerging technology, and entrepreneurship could gather. At the time, this wasn’t necessarily a popular move. For years the conference focused on emerging technologies, media, and creative endeavors. The thought of turning […]
As I’ve worked on the book, I’ve had the opportunity to do quite a bit of traveling to visit important monuments to my family’s past and to meet relatives and friends of the family whom have kept our story alive. The one person I hadn’t had the chance to meet, though, was my grandmother’s youngest […]
Most people from outside the Appalachian region are bombarded with depictions of Appalachians as something otherworldly. This list of shows keeps me up at night and helps me slog through some of the less-than-glamourous parts of pursuing an independent publishing product.
When I first read Black Like Me in high school, I was sick to my stomach for two reason: This was the first time I experienced a hopeless despair about humanity. I wasn’t reading history (although it was set twenty years before); I was reading the now; and It felt oddly strange that it took […]