{"id":64192,"date":"2015-07-21T08:36:19","date_gmt":"2015-07-21T13:36:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.deltastate.edu\/news-and-events\/?p=64192"},"modified":"2015-07-21T08:36:19","modified_gmt":"2015-07-21T13:36:19","slug":"reflections-the-most-southern-place-on-earth-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.deltastate.edu\/news-and-events\/2015\/07\/reflections-the-most-southern-place-on-earth-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Reflections: The Most Southern Place on Earth"},"content":{"rendered":"

For the past six years, The Delta Center for Culture and Learning<\/a> at Delta State University has offered the unique workshop titled \u201cThe Most Southern Place on Earth,\u201d an intensive program supported by the National Endowment for the Humanities.<\/p>\n

This summer, 74 K-12 educators from across the U.S. were once again immersed in two six-day experiential learning workshops in the Mississippi Delta. Participants take what learn back to their schools, teaching students and colleagues about the rich history and cultural heritage of the Delta region.<\/p>\n

Participant\u00a0Valencia Robinson, born in the Delta but raised out-of-state, offered her reflections on the special opportunity.<\/span><\/p>\n

***<\/p>\n

I came to the Mississippi Delta with mixed feelings and emotions. This is the place where my parents lived (Clarksdale), and the place where I was born (Shelby). Several friends and coworkers asked me why I applied for this particular NEH seminar. I could have chosen several other places in the country to visit and learn. Why in the world would I want to go to Mississippi was the question I was asked numerous times. My response to them was that it was the place where my parents lived and my birthplace and that something in my heart beckoned me to the Most Southern Place on Earth.<\/span><\/p>\n

I had never visited Mississippi before. The views I had of Mississippi were ALL negative from just reading about the horrors of my ancestors from slavery, peonage, and the civil rights movement. There was absolutely no reason to ever visit such a place where white people had the power to hold blacks down and they relished in that power well after the civil rights movement ended. My thoughts about Mississippi have now changed after having visited. Mississippi is just one of MOST states that treated African Americans unfairly. Why judge them so harshly?<\/span><\/p>\n

From the beginning of the workshop, learning of the buildup of soil and how it creates a land form called a delta and actually walking along the Mississippi River Delta, to the highly anticipated night at Po\u2019 Monkey\u2019s, I was immersed in a study of people, history, culture and music. Every lecture inspired me, every song uplifted me and every taste of the day convinced me that the uniqueness of this state is what makes Mississippi such a great place to visit and live.<\/span><\/p>\n

I was blessed to have my daughters with me to share the events of each day. They learned so much from me telling them about my daily activities, reading the daily itinerary, reading the entire Emmett Till exhibit, reading the required articles, Simeon\u2019s story and Silver Rights.<\/span><\/p>\n

After a week of intense study of the Delta, a classmate that I hadn\u2019t seen since I graduated from high school \u2014 Kathy Roberts Clark \u2014 saw my Facebook posts at Po\u2019 Monkey\u2019s and sent me a message letting me know that she now lived in Cleveland. We met at Mississippi Grounds for coffee and a great reunion. We reminisced about our elementary, middle, and high school days growing up in a small town like Cleveland \u2014 Marianna, Florida. We discussed race matters and we both realized we were blessed to grow up during the era that we did. We played together, sat together for lunch, visited each other\u2019s homes and didn\u2019t give it a second thought. We were just friends and that\u2019s what friends did.<\/span><\/p>\n

I am grateful for having had this opportunity. I thank the National Endowment for the Humanities for continuing to sponsor these landmark workshops. They are very much needed. If it were not for this workshop I don\u2019t think I would have ever visited Mississippi. Delta State University is the perfect university to host this program and the workshop presenters, Dr. Luther Brown, Dr. Rolando Herts, Lee Alyward and all of the speakers were wonderfully engaging, sharing their own personal stories of tragedy and triumph in Mississippi.<\/span><\/p>\n

My mom left Clarksdale in 1972 and she has not been back to Mississippi. I am planning a trip in the very near future \u2014 hopefully during the Christmas holidays \u2014 to bring my entire family, my mother, and my sister\u2019s family to Cleveland and Clarksdale. This was such a remarkable experience for me and I just have to share it with my entire family. I just can\u2019t wait to get back.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For the past six years, The Delta Center for Culture and Learning at Delta State University has offered the unique workshop titled \u201cThe Most Southern Place on Earth,\u201d an intensive…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":144,"featured_media":64190,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[418,28,296],"tags":[1184,412,1329],"class_list":["post-64192","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-community-3","category-delta-center","category-facultystaff","tag-delta","tag-delta-center-for-culture-and-learning","tag-national-endowment-for-the-humanities"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.deltastate.edu\/news-and-events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64192","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.deltastate.edu\/news-and-events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.deltastate.edu\/news-and-events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.deltastate.edu\/news-and-events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/144"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.deltastate.edu\/news-and-events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=64192"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.deltastate.edu\/news-and-events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64192\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":64194,"href":"https:\/\/www.deltastate.edu\/news-and-events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64192\/revisions\/64194"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.deltastate.edu\/news-and-events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/64190"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.deltastate.edu\/news-and-events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=64192"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.deltastate.edu\/news-and-events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=64192"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.deltastate.edu\/news-and-events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=64192"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}