Life on the Mississippi

Kim Lacy Rogers wins national award for book about the Mississippi Delta

October 9, 2007

Before her latest award-winning work, Kim Lacy Rogers had authored Righteous Lives: Narratives of the New Orleans Civil Rights Movement.

Anyone who doubts that a "good read" can also be great scholarship should try Professor of History Kim Lacy Rogers' latest book, Life and Death in the Delta: African American Narratives of Violence, Resilience, and Social Change.

In it, Rogers uses compelling oral histories to reveal the collective trauma and social suffering that terrorism, staggering poverty and economic exploitation have inflicted on black Mississippi Deltans in the 20th century—both before and after the civil rights movement.

Recently, Rogers' book received the 2007 Oral History Association Book Award. The association committee that reviewed the book described it as "skillfully written" and a "clear-eyed look at the legacy of the civil rights movement." One nominator for the book noted that it is so cohesively written that "individual narrators reflect on the effects of this movement, but their stories, taken together, form a community story."

Other reviews of the book have been equally laudatory. Alessandro Portelli, the prize-winning author of The Order Has Been Carried Out, wrote, "This book is a work of first-class scholarship, deep sensitivity, clear and effective writing: oral history and social conscience at its best. It will be essential reading for a long time." Arthur W. Frank, a professor of sociology at the University of Calgary and author of several books, including The Renewal of Generosity, said that "[Rogers] makes a major contribution to understanding social suffering. She uses narrative as a hinge connecting the personal to the social, telling a story that is moving, dark, and unforgettable."

For her part, Rogers says that working on the book was an "arduous and rewarding process" but feels "fortunate in having had the continuing support of Dickinson College, a wonderful grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, and a year's residency at the National Humanities Center"—all of which allowed her to write the book.

Rogers will be honored at a special awards dinner held by the Oral History Association in Oakland, Calif., on Oct. 27.