News – Page 2 – The Frances S. Summersell Center for the Study of the South

Summersell Center Receives Grant to Develop Queer History Website

May 22, 2019

Dr. John Giggie and the Summersell Center were recently chosen to receive a 2019 Teaching Grant from The University of Alabama College of Arts & Sciences to develop Queer Alabama, the digital humanities website that came out of the course “Invisible Histories,” that was taught this spring. It will fund the work of student Isabella Garrison as she refines and expands the website this summer. The site showcases the research done by students documenting the queer community at The University […]

Summersell Students Launch Queer Alabama Site

May 16, 2019

Students in Director of the Summersell Center Dr. John Giggie’s Spring 2019 course Invisible Histories: Queer History South have unveiled the website for their research, Queer Alabama. The website features each of the students’ research projects, all of which analyze the queer community’s impact on The University of Alabama campus and its broader Tuscaloosa, Alabama, and Southeastern contexts. Individual projects include the Cartography of Southern Queerness, which looks at maps created by the group to see how their use of […]

Dr. Tera Hunter Visits Campus for Summersell Book Prize

May 10, 2019

This past semester, Dr. Tera Hunter, Edwards Professor of American History and Professor of African American Studies at Princeton University, visited campus to receive the Fourth Biennial Deep South Book Prize from the Summersell Center for the Study of the South for her book Bound in Wedlock: Slave and Free Black Marriage in the Nineteenth Century (Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2017). Hunter presented a talk on her book and spoke with students at a luncheon. In her book, […]

Summersell Center and Civil Rights History Task Force Publish Civil Rights Trail Book

May 9, 2019

Director of the Frances J. Summersell Center for the Study of the South , Dr. John Giggie, working with students from his class on Religion and Civil Rights at The University of Alabama and members of the Tuscaloosa Civil Rights History Task Force, recently published a 37-page Civil Rights History Trail guide for the city of Tuscaloosa. Based partly on student research, the pamphlet chronicles the history of key events, institutions, and individuals associated with the local history of the movement. In […]

Summersell Student Wins First Place in URSCA

April 26, 2019

History major and Summersell Center for the Study of the South student Isabella Garrison of Raleigh, North Carolina, took first place in the College of Arts & Sciences’ Summit for Undergraduate Research, Scholarship and Creative Activity (URSCA) poster competition for her presentation on “The Cartography of Southern Queerness.” URSCA allows undergraduate students the opportunity to highlight their research and creativity at UA. Garrison uncovered a deeper understanding of the emergence of the queer movement at the University of Alabama, specifically […]

Summersell Center Partners With Central High School to Teach About Lynching History

April 17, 2019

Dr. John Giggie and the Summersell Center for the Study of the South were recently recognized for their efforts to map the history of lynching victims in Alabama and develop a program for teaching about racial violence and southern history at the secondary education level. The Council on Community-Based Partnerships at The University of Alabama awarded Dr. Giggie a grant to expand the Center’s partnership with Central High School in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Specifically, the Community Engagement Graduate Fellowship covers the […]

Summersell Center Students Present at National Conference

April 9, 2019

Students enrolled in Dr. John Giggie’s Invisible Histories course recently presented research posters at the Queer History South Conference, which was held in Birmingham, Alabama, from March 27 through March 29. Invisible Histories is the first course of its kind in the history department — dedicated to learning about queer history and specifically recapturing the emergence of the queer student movement at The University of Alabama and across the state. Dr. Giggie has taken groups of students to three conferences […]

Summersell Center to Host Tera Hunter on January 25

January 15, 2019

Dr. Tera Hunter, Edwards Professor of American History and Professor of African American Studies at Princeton University, will deliver a public lecture on African America marriage in slavery and freedom on January 25, at 4:30 PM, in 30 ten Hoor Hall. Hunter’s Bound in Wedlock: Slave and Free Black Marriage in the Nineteenth Century (Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2017) won the Fourth Biennial Deep South Book Prize from the Summersell Center for the Study of the South. According to the […]

Summersell Center Sponsors Undergraduate Attendance at SHA Conference

November 28, 2018

The Summersell Center and Director Dr. John Giggie sponsored the attendance of four undergraduate students – Margaret Lawson, Isabella Garrison, Emma Pepperman, and Morgan Alexander (not pictured) – at the Southern Historical Association‘s 2018 Conference in Birmingham, Alabama this past month. The SHA is a major conference on historical research into the American South. The students, who are all planning on pursuing graduate study after graduation, were able to meet and network with graduate students, historians, editors, and The University […]

Students Visit Equal Justice Initiative

November 2, 2018

Dr. John Giggie and the students in his Alabama Memory: Lynching in Alabama class recently visited the Equal Justice Initiative in Montgomery, Alabama. There they presented the research they have done so far in the class. They also visited the National Memorial for Peace and Justice and EJI’s new museum, The Legacy Museum: From Slavery to Mass Incarceration.