2009 Alabama Writers Symposium in Monroeville

Registration has begun for the 12th annual Alabama Writers Symposium to be held on April 30-May 2, 2009. Symposium events will be held on the campus of Alabama Southern Community College, at the Monroeville Community House, and at the Old Courthouse Museum in downtown Monroeville, Ala. This year's theme is "Mystery, Murder, Mayhem, & More."

Participating writers and literary scholars include Nancy Anderson, Philip Beidler, Jake Berry, Rick Bragg, Alan Brown, Kirk Curnutt, Tim Dorsey, Robert Gray, John Hafner, Carolyn Haines, Bert Hitchcock, Frank Turner Hollon, Jennifer Horne, Ravi Howard, Hank Lazer, Don Noble, Julia Oliver, Jennifer Paddock, Tito Perdue, Gin Phillips, Michael Piafsky, Jeanie Thompson and Sue Brannan Walker.

Festival activities include readings, presentations, discussions, workshops, and a dramatization of Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird.

Download the brochure (PDF format) for "Mystery, Murder, Mayhem, & More," 2009 Alabama Writers Symposium.

Midge Coates, Project Manager
This Goodly Land: Alabama's Literary Landscape

Writing Today at Birmingham-Southern College, March 13-14

Registration has begun for the 28th annual Writing Today writers' conference, which will be held on March 13-14, 2009, on the campus of Birmingham-Southern College.

Conference activities include presentations by two Major Speakers (novelist Mark Winegardner and poet David Kirby), author readings, and workshops. This year, the program will also include a live taping of the public television program Bookmark, with host Don Noble interviewing Mark Winegardner.

Speakers with Alabama connections include Myra Crawford, Charles Ghigna, Thom Gossom, Hank Lazer, Don Noble, Wendy Rawlings, and R. A. Riekki.

Learn more about the Writing Today conference and register online.

Midge Coates, Project Manager
This Goodly Land: Alabama's Literary Landscape

Reminder: Lewis Nordan Symposium Coming Up on Friday, January 23

Just a reminder:

The CMDCAH Symposium on the life and work of Alabama writer Lewis "Buddy" Nordan will be held on Friday, January 23, at the Hotel at Auburn University and Dixon Conference Center.

Nordan himself will deliver the keynote address, "Don't Cry for Me, Itta Bena," at 7 PM on Friday evening. He will be introduced by writer Clyde Edgerton, who will also sing his rendition of Nordan's "Sugar Among the Chickens."

This year, the Symposium will also be available as a live Webcast. Online attendees can see and hear the presentations in real time and ask questions of the speakers via a chat window. (This system is optimized for PC users; Mac users may experience difficulties.)

Log in to the Nordan Symposium "conference room" as a guest.

The Symposium is free and open to the public. For more information, see the Caroline Marshall Draughon Center for the Arts & Humanities' Symposium page.

Midge Coates, Project Manager
This Goodly Land: Alabama's Literary Landscape

Lewis Nordan and the Heartbreaking Laughter of Transcendence and Hope: A Symposium

The Caroline Marshall Draughon Center for the Arts & Humanities presents a Symposium on renowned author Lewis "Buddy" Nordan, an Auburn University graduate and nationally acclaimed author of eight books including Music of the Swamp and The Sharpshooter Blues. The day-long event will be held on January 23 at the Hotel at Auburn University and Dixon Conference Center.

The Symposium will bring together a host of well-known writers, international scholars, experts in Alabama and Southern literature, and Auburn University's own art and theater students. Nordan himself will deliver the keynote address, introduced by North Carolina writer Clyde Edgerton, who will sing his rendition of Nordan's "Sugar Among the Chickens" and offer an appreciation of the author. Celebrated author Hal Crowther will offer his own appreciation of Nordan entitled "Critical Barbs: Archer or Arrow Catcher," introduced by Southern literary scholar Noel Polk.

Other speakers will include international scholars Manuel Broncano and Marcel Arbeit and Alabamians Bert Hitchcock, Don Noble, Constance Relihan, and Barbara A. Baker. Auburn University art students will display drawings rendered from Nordan's stories, and theater students will enact a dramatic reading of "How Bob Steele Broke My Father's Heart."

The Nordan Symposium will be recorded and made available through iTunes, and papers from the Symposium will be compiled in a volume to be published by Pebble Hill Books. The program will be of interest to both general and scholarly audiences and to aficionados of great Southern storytelling.

Read more about the Symposium at the CMDCAH blog.

Find the Symposium schedule, directions, hotel information, and a brief video of Lewis Nordan at the CMDCAH Web site.

Download the Symposium press packet, which includes a poster and a press release.

Midge Coates, Project Manager
This Goodly Land: Alabama's Literary Landscape

Video: Albert Murray Symposium online

On January 23, 2008, the Caroline Marshall Draughon Center for the Arts & Humanities, with the Dean of the College of Liberal Arts in Auburn University, the Auburn University English Department, and Tuskegee University, sponsored "Albert Murray and the Aesthetic Imagination of a Nation: A Symposium," a scholarly examination of the life and work of Alabama author Albert Murray (profiled on This Goodly Land).

The symposium sessions were recorded and have been made available online. You can watch them as streaming video from YouTube or download them as free video podcasts from iTunes.

Watch the symposium on YouTube:

"Introduction." Speakers: Mark Wilson, Anne-Katrin Gramberg, Auburn University (9:11)

Session One, Part One: "Jack the Rabbit and an Alabama Briar Patch." Speaker: Jay Lamar, Auburn University (19:30)

Session One, Part Two: "Cosmos Murray and the Aesthetic Imagination of a Nation." Speaker: Barbara A. Baker, Tuskegee University (25:54)

Session Two, Part One: "Albert Murray and Tuskegee Institute: Art As the True Measure of Place." Speaker: A. Caroline Gebhard, Tuskegee University (27:58)

Session Two, Part Two: "Confrontation and Transcendence in Twenty-First Century Blues." Speaker: Jackie McCorvey, Jr., Tuskegee University (14:31)

Session Three, Part One: "Albert Murray and Visual Art." Speaker: Paul Devlin, Stony Brook University (SUNY) (32:11)

Session Three, Part Two: "Dewey's Pragmatism Extended: Education and Aesthetic Practice in Train Whistle Guitar." Speaker: Roberta S. McGuire, University of Wisconsin Oshkosh (27:32)

Session Four, Part One: "Murray and Mann: Variations on a Theme." Speaker: Lauren Walsh, Columbia University (23:56)

Session Four, Part Two: "Murray's Mulatto America." Speaker: Maurice Pogue, Michigan State University (26:33)

Session Five, Part One: "Chinaberry Tree, Chinaberry Tree." Speaker: Bert Hitchcock, Auburn University (26:31)

Session Five, Part Two: "Hyphens, Heroes, and Dragons: A Conversation with Albert Murray." Speaker: Don Noble, University of Alabama (12:01)

Keynote Session: "'It Don't Mean a Thing If It Ain't Got That Swing': Albert Murray, Omni-American." Speaker: John Callahan, Lewis and Clark College (56:44)

Keynote Questions. Speaker: John Callahan (4:44)

Download the symposium as free podcasts from iTunes:

Open your browser and go to the Auburn University iTunes page.

Click on the OPEN AU ITUNES link in the center of the page. You will get a pop-up window asking you to launch iTunes. Click on Launch Application. (You must already have the iTunes software on your computer to download these videos. You can download it from the iTunes Home Page.)

The iTunes Store will open up at the Auburn University section. Click on the icon for the College of Liberal Arts, then click on the icon for the Albert Murray symposium. The symposium sessions will now be available for you to download.

(These video files are very large and have long download times. Depending on the speed of your Internet connection, you may need to download them one at a time to prevent the system from timing out. )

Midge Coates, Project Manager
This Goodly Land: Alabama's Literary Landscape