Category: North Carolina

Adrian Miller’s Top 5 Favorite UNC Press Books #UNCP100

In celebration of our centennial year, we’ve asked our authors to write some guest blog posts to help celebrate with us! We’re kicking off our centennial blog post series with a post from Adrian Miller, author of award-winning book Black Smoke: African Americans and the United States of Barbecue. In Black Smoke, Miller chronicles how Black barbecuers, pitmasters, and restauranteurs helped… Continue Reading Adrian Miller’s Top 5 Favorite UNC Press Books #UNCP100

North Carolina In The Connected Age: The Creation of the Connected Age

The following is an excerpt from Michael L. Walden’s North Carolina In The Connected Age: Challenges and Opportunities in a Globalizing Economy. At a time when North Carolina’s population is exploding and its economy is shifting profoundly, one of the state’s leading economists applies the tools of his trade to chronicle these changes and to inform North Carolinians in easy-to-understand… Continue Reading North Carolina In The Connected Age: The Creation of the Connected Age

National Technology Day: Recommended Reading List

January 6th marks National Technology Day. Technology has been a huge stepping stone in the advancement of so many cultures. From the technology we use in our everyday lives to NASA’s own technology used for space exploration, it’s always been closely connected to the overall progress of America. In celebration of National Technology Day, we’re sharing a recommended reading list… Continue Reading National Technology Day: Recommended Reading List

“Island Wildlife Reads: Saving the Wild South with Georgann Eubanks”, Author Georgann Eubanks speaks with the North Carolina Wildlife Federation

Last month, UNC Press author of Saving the Wild South Georgann Eubanks  sat with the North Carolina Wildlife Federation to discuss her book. The American South is famous for its astonishingly rich biodiversity. In this book, Georgann Eubanks takes a wondrous trek from Alabama to North Carolina to search out native plants that are endangered and wavering on the edge of erasure.… Continue Reading “Island Wildlife Reads: Saving the Wild South with Georgann Eubanks”, Author Georgann Eubanks speaks with the North Carolina Wildlife Federation

Civil Rights Unionism: Those Who Were Not Afraid

The following is an excerpt from Robert R. Korstad’s Civil Rights Unionism: Tobacco Workers and the Struggle for Democracy in the Mid-Twentieth-Century South. Drawing on scores of interviews with black and white tobacco workers in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, Robert Korstad brings to life the forgotten heroes of Local 22 of the Food, Tobacco, Agricultural and Allied Workers of America-CIO. These… Continue Reading Civil Rights Unionism: Those Who Were Not Afraid

Universal Human Rights Month: A Recommended Reading List

Nobody’s free until everybody’s free. Fannie Lou Hamer December marks the annual celebration of Universal Human Rights Month. The observance of this month began in 1948 when the U.N. wrote a document called The Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The document was created after World War II and was used to “properly define what human rights would be protected universally”.… Continue Reading Universal Human Rights Month: A Recommended Reading List

Author Book Events in the Time of Covid

The following is a guest blog post from Georgann Eubanks, author of Saving The Wild South: The Fight for Native Plants on the Brink of Extinction. The American South is famous for its astonishingly rich biodiversity. In this book, Georgann Eubanks takes a wondrous trek from Alabama to North Carolina to search out native plants that are endangered and wavering on the… Continue Reading Author Book Events in the Time of Covid

Staff Picks: 2021 UNC Press Holiday Gift Guide

We hope you’ve got your hot chocolate and eggnog ready for this winter season! Today we wanted to share some holiday gift recommendations from our staff. Don’t forget, we’re having a Holiday Sale too! Save 40% on any of these great stocking stuffers and all of our other UNC Press print books. You’ll also receive free shipping on orders of… Continue Reading Staff Picks: 2021 UNC Press Holiday Gift Guide

“Julius Chambers: Child of the Jim Crow South”

The following is an excerpt from Richard A. Rosen and Joseph Mosnier’s Julius Chambers: A Life in the Legal Struggle for Civil Rights. Born in the hamlet of Mount Gilead, North Carolina, Julius Chambers (1936–2013) escaped the fetters of the Jim Crow South to emerge in the 1960s and 1970s as the nation’s leading African American civil rights attorney. Following… Continue Reading “Julius Chambers: Child of the Jim Crow South”

New and Recently Released UNC Press Audiobooks

We are pleased to announce the availability of the following UNC Press titles in audiobook format (sample audio excerpts are available via the links below): Those Who Know Don’t Say: The Nation of Islam, the Black Freedom Movement, and the Carceral State by Garrett Felber, published by Tantor Media Felber . . . examines how the Nation of Islam, and… Continue Reading New and Recently Released UNC Press Audiobooks

NC Seems Untroubled by its Shockingly High Child Poverty

The following is a guest blog post by Gene R. Nichol, author of The Faces of Poverty in North Carolina: Stories from Our Invisible Citizens. More than 1.5 million North Carolinians today live in poverty. More than one in five are children. Behind these sobering statistics are the faces of our fellow citizens. This book tells their stories. Since 2012,… Continue Reading NC Seems Untroubled by its Shockingly High Child Poverty

Happy Rosa Parks Day: A Recommended Reading List

December 1st, 1955, marks the day civil rights activist Rosa Parks rejected a bus driver’s order, in Montgomery, Alabama, to give up her seat in the “colored” section of the bus to a white passenger, after the whites-only section had already been filled. She was then arrested and convicted of violating the laws of segregation. However, Rosa Parks was able… Continue Reading Happy Rosa Parks Day: A Recommended Reading List

“Lumbee Indians in the Jim Crow South: Adapting to Segregation”

The following is an excerpt from Malinda Maynor Lowery’s Lumbee Indians in the Jim Crow South: Race, Identity, and the Making of a Nation. With more than 50,000 enrolled members, North Carolina’s Lumbee Indians are the largest Native American tribe east of the Mississippi River. Malinda Maynor Lowery, a Lumbee herself, describes how, between Reconstruction and the 1950s, the Lumbee… Continue Reading “Lumbee Indians in the Jim Crow South: Adapting to Segregation”

Authors Adrian Miller and John Shelton Reed in Conversation at the Southern Festival of Books

Earlier this month we shared a virtual conversation held at the 33rd annual Southern Festival of Books. We’re back this week with another conversation and the topic is barbecue. Adrian Miller, author of Black Smoke: African Americans and the United States of Barbecue, and John Shelton Reed, co-author of Holy Smoke: The Big Book of North Carolina Barbecue, break down barbecue;… Continue Reading Authors Adrian Miller and John Shelton Reed in Conversation at the Southern Festival of Books

Happy National Native American Heritage Month: A Reading List

Since 1990, November has been nationally celebrated as Native American Heritage Month. We take this month to honor the cultures, histories and contributions that Native people have made throughout the years. To help celebrate, we’ve curated a reading list of books from all Native American authors touching on different aspects of Native American life. We would also like to highlight… Continue Reading Happy National Native American Heritage Month: A Reading List

Saving The Wild South: Yadkin River Goldenrod and Heller’s Blazing Star

Happy tenth anniversary to University Press Week! This year’s Association of University Presses annual celebration, running from November 8-12, “welcomes all to ‘Keep UP’ with a decade of excellence and innovation.”  For UP Week’s annual blog tour, today’s specific theme, Innovate/Collaborate, today’s bloggers describe an innovation or a collaboration in the last decade that they are particularly proud of or that will provide a model for… Continue Reading Saving The Wild South: Yadkin River Goldenrod and Heller’s Blazing Star

Authors Georgann Eubanks and Cynthia Kaufman in Conversation at the Southern Festival of Books

Last month, UNC Press author of Saving the Wild South Georgann Eubanks and Cynthia Kaufman held a conversation for the 33rd annual Southern Festival of Books. Georgann and Cynthia share how to preserve disappearing fauna and take a more active role in combating climate change at the local level. Climate change headlines tell of devastating floods and wildfires, but there… Continue Reading Authors Georgann Eubanks and Cynthia Kaufman in Conversation at the Southern Festival of Books

Frank Graham, Pauli Murray, and the Search for Racial Justice

The following is a guest blog post by William A. Link, author of Frank Porter Graham: Southern Liberal, Citizen of the World. Frank Porter Graham (1886–1972) was one of the most consequential white southerners of the twentieth century. Born in Fayetteville and raised in Charlotte, Graham became an active and popular student leader at the University of North Carolina. After earning a… Continue Reading Frank Graham, Pauli Murray, and the Search for Racial Justice

“Flyleaf: The Wilmington Ten”, NC Department of Natural & Cultural Resources’ Monthly Facebook Live Conversation Featuring Dr. Kenneth Robert Janken and Mr. Sean Palmer

Earlier in October, the North Carolina Department of Natural & Cultural Resources’ hosted their monthly Flyleaf Facebook Live conversation with UNC Press author Kenneth Robert Janken and UNC Wilmington’s Director of the Upperman African American Cultural Center Sean Palmer. Palmer and Janken discussed Janken’s book The Wilmington Ten: Violence, Injustice, and the Rise of Black Politics in the 1970s and… Continue Reading “Flyleaf: The Wilmington Ten”, NC Department of Natural & Cultural Resources’ Monthly Facebook Live Conversation Featuring Dr. Kenneth Robert Janken and Mr. Sean Palmer

Frank Porter Graham and Academic Freedom

The following is a guest blog post by William A. Link, author of Frank Porter Graham: Southern Liberal, Citizen of the World. Frank Porter Graham (1886–1972) was one of the most consequential white southerners of the twentieth century. Born in Fayetteville and raised in Charlotte, Graham became an active and popular student leader at the University of North Carolina. After earning… Continue Reading Frank Porter Graham and Academic Freedom