Field School 2018: West Virginia Coalfields

I've been looking forward to this day for over a year. We arrived to South Charleston to a lovely AirBnB late yesterday afternoon. Today we travel to Mingo County to interview mining families at the Matewan Union Hall.  The ten students who are with me: graduate students from Mason's Folklore Studies Program, Anthropology Program and …

New Story: West Virginia Seizes the Narrative

I spent two amazing days in Morgantown, WV last week for New Story 2017. This is my second time at the conference, which features some of the most amazing initiatives taking place in my home state. New Story is reclaiming West Virginia's narrative, providing a networking opportunity for people doing work in the state accomplish …