Leading the Southern Oral History Program

Click on links at the bottom of this story for more articles on the Center for the Study of the American South. Read a story on the 40th anniversary of the Program.

Historian Malinda Maynor Lowery was named the new director of the Southern Oral History Program in July 2013.

Lowery will serve as the second permanent director of the Program. Jacquelyn Dowd Hall is the founding director emerita and Julia Cherry Spruill Professor of History at UNC. Communication studies professor Della Pollock served as interim director between 2011 and 2013.

“Professor Lowery is a brilliant scholar and visionary leader who is perfectly positioned to enhance the Southern Oral History Program’s national reputation for collaboration, mentorship, public service, and scholarly and technical innovation, while also taking the program in bold new directions,” said Hall.

Lowery, associate professor of history, is a member of the Lumbee Tribe of North Carolina. Her book, Lumbee Indians in the Jim Crow South: Race, Identity, and the Making of a Nation (UNC Press, 2010), received the 2011 Labriola American Indian Center National Book Award and the Best 2010 First Book Award from the Native American and Indigenous Studies Association.

Lowery has produced four documentary films about Native American issues, including the award-winning In the Light of Reverence, which aired on PBS in 2001, reaching more than 3 million people. Two previous films, Real Indian and Sounds of Faith, examine Lumbee identity and culture, and the most recent is an online video for Native survivors of domestic violence featuring the Lumbee and Eastern Band Cherokee tribes (www.survivortosurvivor.org).

Her current book project is a history of the Lumbee tribe for a general audience, forthcoming from UNC Press.

Hall is the recipient of the 2013 Mary Turner Lane Award, a University honor that recognizes people who make outstanding contributions to the lives of women students, faculty, staff and administrators at Carolina.

During 40 years on the Carolina faculty, Hall has advocated for women in every aspect of her career: her research and professional leadership, her award-winning teaching, her mentoring of both undergraduate and graduate students, and her service to her profession and to the University.

More stories about the Center for the Study of the American South:

Front Porch Portal: Home for Southern research celebrates 20 years

Pete Seeger Remembers, an excerpt from Bill Ferris’ new book

From Plantation to Prison Farm: Exploring the history of Caledonia in Halifax, County

 Southern Cultures: Journal covers it all, from tobacco queens to blues music

Preserving the Voices: Southern Oral History Program celebrates 40 years