W&M Featured Events

This calendar presented by William & Mary

[PAST EVENT] Deeply Rooted: Preserving and Celebrating Gullah Geechee Heritage

April 27, 2023
6pm - 7pm
Location
Zoom meeting
Access & Features
  • Open to the public
  • Registration/RSVP
image of the low country and three presenters

Lemon's Legacies Porch Talks in Spring 2023 will focus on the theme of the 13th Annual Lemon Project Spring Symposium: "At the Root: Exploring Black Life, History, and Culture."

This Lemon's Legacies Porch Talk explores the relationship between Black life, culture, and history by examining the intersections among personal and professional identities. From the halls of academia to public history festivals, this Porch Talk will provide a unique perspective of preserving and celebrating the cultural heritage of the Gullah Geechee inhabitants of the Carolina Lowcountry and Georgia’s Coastal Empire. While not all members of the panel identify as Gullah Geechee, each of the panelists has their own journey documenting, preserving, and telling this history. Panelists will engage in conversations about the Gullah Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor as a National Heritage Area, the alignment of cultural heritage with professional research and academia as a site of reclamation, and the duty institutions of higher learning have in exposing students to and celebrating local culture/histories. The Porch Talk will highlight several communities in North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida in their efforts to tell their stories through digital humanities and establish cultural centers to transform the narratives about Black life in the coastal southeast.

Panelists

  • Reginald Tendaji Bailey, Gullah Geechee Consultant
    Tendaji is a Gullah Geechee native of Port Royal & St Helena Island, SC in Beaufort County. He is a 2015 graduate of Morehouse College and former middle school math teacher and community organizer.
    As a Gullah Geechee Consultant, he helps to develop programs and events to educate the public about the rich history and culture of Gullah Geechee communities throughout the coastal southeast.

    Joyce White, Ph.D    ., Assistant Professor of English in Gullah Geechee Literature and Cultures, Georgia Southern University
  • Joyce received her Ph.D. in Humanities with a primary focus in African American Studies from Clark Atlanta University and earned a BA and MA in English from Florida State University. Her research interests include 19th, 20th, and 21st-century African American and diasporic literature, as well as African cosmological and spiritual continuities in diasporic literature and cultural productions.

    Kyle R. Fox    , Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Communication, The College of Coastal Georgia
  • Kyle received his Ph.D. in Humanities with a concentration in African American Studies from Clark Atlanta University and earned a BA in Political Science and African American Studies as well as a MA in Communication Studies with concentrations in Race, Political, and Gender Rhetoric from The University of Alabama. His research focuses on the construction and performance of gendered and raced identities, specifically, Black masculinity.
Contact

Sarah Thomas, [[lemon]]