Quick Updates + Interview with Our New South
Quick Updates + Interview with Our New South
Sounds Like Impact: A newsletter for audio and action
Welcome to Sounds Like Impact!
This week we have an interview with Kevin Blackistone and Dr. Robert Greene from Our New South podcast.
We do not have a podcast curation this week, but I’ll return with a special #BlackHistoryMonth curation next week!
ICYMI: Last week we talked about the juvenile “justice” system and I interviewed Avril Speaks from Distribution Advocates podcast.
Reminder: Please make sure to pitch! To guest curate, share episodes, be interviewed, advertise and more, click here.
🙌🏾 Congrats to The Ambies nominees! If you go through the list, you’ll recognize some familiar shows and creators, including Weight For It, Expectant, National Emergency, Dear Alana, abandoned: The All American Ruins Podcast, Free From Desire and Beyond 6 Seconds: Neurodiversity Stories.
If you, dear reader, were nominated as well, please share in the comments so we can celebrate you too!
📣 Spotlight
Kevin Blackstone and Dr. Robert Greene are the hosts of the podcast, Our New South. You can learn more about the hosts by clicking below. Read on to understand what the “New South” means to them and what they hope listeners get out of the show.
Our New South offers a unique look at the evolution of the New South and how historic Southern cities, including Charlotte, North Carolina, are confronting complex issues, ranging from equity in education and immigration to civil rights, racial equality, and socioeconomic mobility.
To borrow a question you ask your show’s guests, what are your definitions of the “New South”?
Kevin: It is everything most people from beyond it think it is not. It is no longer, of course, the cauldron of racial violence that came to define it, while acknowledging the Mother Emanuel massacre and Charlottesville. But it is not a place people of color, in particular, are fleeing; instead, it is a place they not only are returning to but are running in myriad ways, as elected officials, appointed city managers, and business executives. Yet, it is still a place defined by the defiance of people of color, whether it is Bree Newsome snatching down the Confederate flag or Stacey Abrams organizing voters to elect a Black Democrat from Georgia to the Senate. It is almost as if it is under a new reconstruction.
Robert: For me, the “New South” is a South that is grappling with its long history of Indigenous displacement, slavery, and Jim Crow segregation. This is not–nor can it be–an easy process. But the “New South” also means being a welcoming place, and using the past to look positively to a future that includes everyone, regardless of race, color, gender, national origin, or sexual orientation.
For many Americans, “the South” has a negative connotation. Much of that is, historically, deserved. But I hope listeners come away from our podcast understanding that many Southerners are trying to change the region for the better, while also keeping the best of Southern traditions–foodways, storytelling, music-making, and generosity–alive in the 21st century.
This is a presidential election year here in the U.S. Was this top of mind when developing the show, and if so, what do you want the show to accomplish as it relates to this election and the state-wide/ local races that will also be decided in November?
Robert: It certainly played a role in our discussion of voting rights, education, and environmental justice. But it’s also important, as your question points out, to focus on local and state races as well. Most Southern legislatures have, in a generation, rapidly switched from Democratic to Republican control. This is going to have long-term effects on politics in the region and across the nation. Also, there is a great deal of exciting grassroots work on voting rights and access to the ballot being done in states such as Georgia and North Carolina–listeners across the nation should learn more about that, too.
What would be your pitch to listen for those who live outside of the South, particularly if they don’t have any Southern roots?
Kevin: What I didn’t think about before delving into this podcast was how much the rest of this country was and continues to be heavily influenced by the South, arguably more so than any other region of the country impacts the rest of the country. Of late, we’ve seen it’s power at the ballot box with the election in Georgia of a Black Democrat and Jewish Democrat who flipped control of the U.S. Senate. While we’ve seen the demonization of immigrants at the Texas and Arizona borders by reactionary politicians, quietly the South has welcomed and integrated immigrants at numbers great enough to boost its economy. And the South continues to influence the rest of the country that imports its food and music and art. Is there a North American cuisine more ubiquitous than Southern cooking? A music more regionally identifiable than country, or New Orleans brass band jazz, or Dirty South rap? The South is all around us, if not in us, no matter where we are.
Robert: It’s critical for every American to understand a bit about the South. What happens in the South never stays here. So, to get a grasp on where the nation is going, you need to see what is happening in the South. Also, so many cultural, social, and political trends that originate in the South spread across the nation. Whether it’s the contemporary sound of hip hop, the Black support for the Democratic Party, or the continuing literary legacy of the region, the South continues to influence the nation and the world.
🌟 Classifieds
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