Southern Cultures Special 25th Anniversary Issue (Here/Away)

by Katharine Henry

Guest Editor: Karida Brown

Submission deadline: March 30, 2019

Southern Cultures, the award-winning quarterly of the UNC Center for the Study of the American South, is planning four special issues in 2019 to mark its 25^th year of publication. The four themes— Backward/Forward, Inside/Outside, Left/Right, and Here/Away—will highlight where the South is coming from and where it’s going, who’s included and who’s left out, how it’s changing and how it’s not, what’s near and what’s far. We’d like contributors to interpret these themes broadly and creatively, mixing serious interpretations of the South’s history, future, space, and politics with reimagined takes on what these tropes should mean going forward.

We invite submissions from scholars, writers, and visual artists for our Winter 2019 issue, Here/Away, through March 30, 2019, at https://southerncultures.submittable.com/submit .

Where is the South, really? In our contemporary moment, we continue to grapple with the various tensions and contradictions that make and remake the South. From its historical legacies of racial slavery, Indian removal, and its various systems of oppression, to its vibrant cultural expressions, traditions, and ways of being, Here/Away seeks to explore and document the region as it looks within its borders and beyond, as it imagines itself and as others see it. The issue will look at stories of diaspora, exile, travel, trade, culture, trafficking, aesthetics, migration/immigration, and regional cooperation and conflict.

We’re looking for solidly grounded studies on major themes, speculations about what’s coming, reflections on the distant past or future, and snapshots of yesterday, today, and tomorrow. We aim to break out of old frameworks and see the past and the future in new ways.

Submissions can cover any topic or theme related to southern communities and peoples, and their roots and routes. We seek pieces that examine the South across time, explore new understandings of the region and its peoples, identify current communities and concerns, and address ongoing struggles for justice and expression going forward. We welcome explorations of the region in the forms Southern Cultures publishes: scholarly articles, memoir, interviews, surveys, photo essays, and shorter feature essays.

Possible topics and questions to explore might include (but are certainly not limited to):

• Diaspora
• Migration/immigration
• Music
• Exile
• Aesthetics
• Travel
• Trade
• Education
• Food
• Trafficking
• Regional belonging
• Factionalism
• Cosmopolitanism
• Globalization
• Industrialization
• Inequality

As Southern Cultures publishes digital content, we encourage creativity in coordinating print and digital materials in submissions and ask that authors submit any potential video, audio, and interactive visual content with their essay or introduction/artist’s statement. We encourage authors to gain familiarity with the tone, scope, and style of our journal before submitting. Those with access to Project Muse can read past issues for free. To read our current issue and our submission guidelines, or browse our content, please visit www.southerncultures.org.