The Florida Humanities Council features Jack E. Davis and AN EVERGLADES PROVIDENCE in Forum, “the magazine for thinking Florida,” and on Florida Public Radio. Listen here. Devin Fergus, author of the forthcoming LIBERALISM, BLACK POWER AND THE MAKING OF AMERICAN POLITICS, 1965-1980, has been awarded a fellowship at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington next year.
Swampland.com praises UGAP’s music titles in its listing of the best music books of 2008 – even books not published in 2008:“The university presses of Georgia, Louisiana, the already mentioned Mississippi, and, more recently, Tennessee remain some of this country’s best for books about music, and I’m going to give myself a bit of temporal leeway in discussing them….Issued two years ago in paperback, both DIXIE LULLABY by Mark Kemp and REAL PUNKS DON’T WEAR BLACK by Frank Kogan, and also the 2005 GOIN’ BACK TO SWEET MEMPHIS, edited by Fred J. Hay, demand a place on the shelves of any Swampland.com reader. And for something truly rich and strange, try this year’s WINNERS HAVE YET TO BE ANNOUNCED, a series of prose poems by Ed Pavlic.”
From the American Historical Review: On ENTREPRENEURS IN THE SOUTHERN UPCOUNTRY: “Recent, compelling works by Mark Smith, Chad Morgan, and Jonathan Daniel Wells have revealed tremendous economic, social, and even political antecedents for the postwar South in its formative antebellum years. Bruce W. Eelman’s book builds upon this literature to establish quite convincingly how so much that seemed new or ‘modern’ in the postwar South originated decades before secession.”
On ATLANTIC LOYALTIES: “McMichael succeeds in providing an updated assessment of the Baton Rouge district under Spanish rule. His analysis is more objective regarding Spain’s administration of the region than those of many past investigators. Slavery is examined in much greater detail than in previous accounts and the author ably supports his claim that the presence of a vibrant Spanish legal culture ‘places West Florida…in something of an exceptional position with regard to U.S. history.’”
From the Journal of Southern History: On GROUNDED GLOBALISM: “This well-crafted book offers optimistic expectations not only for the U.S. South but also for international and transnational relationships. Peacock’s engaging observations are supported by many anecdotes about his own life experiences, and the book has appeal for both scholars and an interested public.”
On MARY TELFAIR TO MARY FEW: “Telfair’s ruminations on men (‘the Insipids’), marriage (‘married life requires a double portion of energy’), and motherhood (‘a very difficult task’) illuminate women’s reasons for remaining single, while her reflections on her daily activities suggest the rewards of single life…Mary Telfair’s letters are a valuable—and now, thanks to editor Betty Wood, a readily accessible—source for those interested in learning about the daily lives and inner worlds of single women in the antebellum South.”
The Spring issue of Reform Judaism magazine presents THE PALE OF SETTLEMENT and an interview with Margot Singer.
And, finally, Alex Vernon gives ON TARZAN the Page 99 test (“Open the book to page ninety-nine and read, and the quality of the whole will be revealed to you” – Ford Madox Ford).
