#EyesontheSouth | After the Word | Grace Ann Elinski
In this brand new feature, Elinski captures signage across Mississippi and Southern Louisiana that when removed from their original contexts become “weathered, contradictory, or quietly intimate.”
🔗: https://shorturl.at/zXoSd
Ten years after Pat Conroy’s death, Jacob Lupfer reconsiders the author’s works that “once defined a certain moral and emotional mode of Southern writing.”
🔗: oxfordamerican.org/oa-now/pat-c...
“The factual analyses of well-educated people fly in the face of the administration’s anti-immigrant agenda.”
—Zack Ford turns to leading US economists, who explain why ICE raids and mass deportations are bad for the country’s bottom line.
🔗: https://shorturl.at/1DJ24
The Oxford American is now accepting pitches for our special Summer/Fall 2026 double issue dedicated to Home! Full details: oxfordamerican.org/submissions
“I don’t plan when I’ll go. But when I do, I pay the river my attention.”
—Anna Lena Phillips Bell shares two poems and a series of photographs of the Northeast Cape Fear River ahead of the release of “Might Could,” out March 1 from Waywiser Books.
🔗: https://shorturl.at/uWLP0
"Since producing venom is metabolically taxing, they don’t necessarily want to waste it. To conserve, the snakes have the ability to meter it out as they bite. They truly are reluctant fighters." —Elsa Pearl for @oxfordamerican.bsky.social
oxfordamerican.org/oa-now/rattl...
We’re hiring! 📣 The Oxford American is seeking an experienced Assistant Editor to join our team beginning in March 2026. Learn more and apply: https://oxfordamerican.org/jobs
“Did I ask to share my home with nine loose rattlesnakes? No. But we knew this was a wild place.”
—Elsa Pearl explores harmful literary portrayals of the timber rattlesnake, shedding light on the threatened species.
🔗: https://shorturl.at/LX9Sl
“If I do leave, I don’t want to leave bitter.”
—Former music editor of The Austin Chronicle reads farewell letters of Austin musicians Nanci Griffith, Doug Sahm, and Daniel Johnston.
🔗: https://shorturl.at/xxQtI
#EyesontheSouth | Pickled Memories | Adrian White
In this feature from the archive, White preserves his family’s history by suspending the photographs in mason jars with corn syrup, “capturing the ‘pickled memories’ in various settings.”
🔗: https://shorturl.at/a7dbI
“The kids kept marching peacefully, chanting, ‘Keep ICE out of Key West!’”
—In part five of his Paranoid Island: ICE in Key West series, Zack Ford traces the impact of arrests and deportations by ICE agents on refugee communities and their loved ones.
🔗: https://shorturl.at/yQ0LU
“When Gary Clark Jr. talks about the blues, he speaks as though it has seeped into his skin.”
—Writer and editor @jiggyraps.bsky.social reflects on the ways that Gary Clark Jr. embraces the new age of blues while carrying on the traditions of the old.
🔗: https://shorturl.at/7ZfDS
#EyesontheSouth | Rewind and Revisit | Stephanie Calabrese
In this new feature, the artist and filmmaker pairs photographs from 2015 and 2025 to trace a “quiet evolution” in the small-town landscape of Monroe, Georgia.
🔗: https://shorturl.at/HePfW
“For a city with a population of less than 300,000, Laredo is bustling.”
—Journalist Aaron Nelson spotlights the Port of Laredo, where more than 18,000 trucks cross daily to bring goods and produce, including the avocado, to the United States from Mexico.
🔗: https://shorturl.at/PrfWA
“Everybody knows everybody and if you don’t know anyone, you’ll meet them here.”
—Grammy-nominated musician @jromarshall.bsky.social spends an evening at the Continental Club Gallery where “Da Homies” and Jon Deas bring jazz to the Austin music scene.
🔗: https://shorturl.at/hALVl
“Like most things with great bones and no frills or frippery, it has all aged beautifully.”
John Jeremiah Sullivan reunites The Reivers to speak on the loss of their original name, “Zeitgeist,” their early gigs and members & stories from the road.
🔗: https://shorturl.at/wLwzb
#EyesontheSouth | Pompeian Quality | M. Laine Wyatt
In this feature from the archive, the Florida-based photographer captures Southern interiors in the absence of human presence to find “clues to the identity of our region.”
🔗: https://shorturl.at/tzjT2
“Then came the ‘Coming Soon: Pickleball’ sign.”
—Journalist Blake Gillespie reports on the community’s fight in Fort Lauderdale to save the iconic seaside Central Beach basketball courts from being replaced by pickleball courts.
🔗: https://shorturl.at/iWyfc
“I could cry thinking about it all over again.”
—Jojo Garza, bassist for Los Lonely Boys, reflects on an encounter with Willie Nelson at Momo’s, a small club that closed in 2011, and the long-lasting friendship that followed.
🔗: https://shorturl.at/GLEQV
#EyesontheSouth | Remain in the Delta | Grant Ellis
In this feature from the archive, Ellis captures life in the Mississippi Delta, writing, “The only rule I made for myself during the creation of this work was to remain in the Delta.”
🔗: https://shorturl.at/3wjiu
For your holiday weekend reading & reflection, here’s my 259th #ScholarSunday thread of great public scholarly writing, podcasts, new & forthcoming books from the past week. Add more below, share as widely as possible, & solidarity, all! 🗃️
blackwhiteandread.com/scholarsunda...
We can’t confront the Mississippi Delta’s past or present inequities unless we can see evidence that inequality exists. For @wralpheubanks.bsky.social, photographs provide evidence. @oxfordamerican.bsky.social
“Willie and Austin City Limits continue to make history—much of it together.”
— @terrylick.bsky.social of Austin City Limits details the history of the program and Willie Nelson’s involvement in helping Austin become the Live Music Capital of the World.
🔗: https://shorturl.at/jsZuU
#EyesontheSouth | Childhood Dreams, Adult Realities | Dason Pettit
Pettit visualizes his memories of growing up in the South by capturing “an almost mythical, not quite fictional” version of Oxford, Mississippi inspired by William Faulkner’s Yoknapatawpha County.
🔗: https://shorturl.at/v7mye
“The story—and the emotion of the story—is the goal.”
—Micah Nelson speaks to the record-making process with his dad, Willie Nelson, and how keeping it unembellished with added production allows it to sound more personal.
🔗: https://shorturl.at/syCHc
“Even when Justin Townes Earle was bullshitting, he was more than a little right.”
—In the introduction to the authorized biography of Justin Townes Earle, @jonbern.bsky.social captures the origins of his storied name and his battle with “the myth.”
🔗: https://shorturl.at/TPMeP
If you'd like a preview, the @oxfordamerican.bsky.social published the book's introduction today as an excerpt!
oxfordamerican.org/oa-now/justi...
Welcome to 2026! In this week's Top 5:
—January begins @theatlantic.com
—Finding beauty @thebeliever.net
—Powerful blues @oxfordamerican.bsky.social
—Toxic water @orionmagazine.bsky.social
—Begonia baton @theobserveruk.bsky.social
#EyesontheSouth | Where Bull Riders Go to Train | Ilie Mitaru
In this new feature, the Emmy-nominated photographer and filmmaker captures scenes from the Optimal Performance Academy in Decatur, Texas, which is injecting science-backed training into the rodeo scene.
🔗: https://shorturl.at/YhAtc
I’ve been giving myself permission to complete some essays on my first love, music. Thanks to @oxfordamerican.bsky.social for running this piece about how the blues can become a sanctuary & rallying cry, an outlet for communal joy in a moment of political tension. oxfordamerican.org/oa-now/a-blu...
