Another Appalachia: Coming up Queer and Indian in a Mountain Place by Neema Avashia"Commands your attention from the first page to the last word." --Morgan Jerkins "I'm glad this memoir exists . . . and I'm especially glad it's so good." --Vauhini Vara, New York Magazine When Neema Avashia tells people where she's from, their response is nearly always a disbelieving "There are Indian people in West Virginia?" A queer Asian American teacher and writer, Avashia fits few Appalachian stereotypes. But the lessons she learned in childhood about race and class, gender and sexuality continue to inform the way she moves through the world today: how she loves, how she teaches, how she advocates, how she struggles. Another Appalachia examines both the roots and the resonance of Avashia's identity as a queer desi Appalachian woman, while encouraging readers to envision more complex versions of both Appalachia and the nation as a whole. With lyric and narrative explorations of foodways, religion, sports, standards of beauty, social media, gun culture, and more, Another Appalachia mixes nostalgia and humor, sadness and sweetness, personal reflection and universal questions.
Black in AppalachiaWe are a non-profit that works in collaboration with public media, residents, university departments, libraries, archives and community organizations to highlight the history and contributions of African-Americans in the development of the Mountain South and its culture. We do that through research, local narratives, public engagement and exhibition. Black in Appalachia is a community service for Appalachian residents and families with roots in the region.
Black Appalachian Coalition (BLAC)We are here. Despite the whitewashed history of rural America, Black people have always existed in the Appalachian region. The Census numbers may be small, but the contributions are huge, including the introduction of the banjo by Black blues musicians in the late 1700s. Just as the instrument played a critical role in the development of modern music, Black residents play a big part in shaping the culture and the conversations of Appalachia and beyond. The Black Appalachian Coalition (BLAC), an initiative of Black Women Rising, launched on June 18, 2021 to ensure accurate and inclusive accounts are being told.
Unraveling the Hidden Black History of Appalachian ActivismBy Jessica Wilkerson. June 27, 2018 for 100 Days in Appalachia. From the late-nineteenth century to the present, the most popular stories of Appalachia have been simplistic tales of white mountaineers. Those stories have infused everything from culture to politics and media. Despite important counter–examples, these stories continue to be the starting place for most Americans’ understanding of Appalachia — one that erases a complex history of race, racism and Black resistance. Placing Black people in Appalachia’s history is not simply a matter of recognizing diversity. Rather, it forces a different angle, a truer way of seeing the region and its relationship to the South and the United States.
Affrilachian Poets library guide from BereaThe term "Affrilachia" was originally coined by Frank X Walker. In reference to the region of Appalachia, a mountain range stretching over thirteen states along the East Coast of the U.S. from Mississippi to New York, Affrilachia is an ever-evolving cultural landscape poised to render the invisible visible. Affrilachia embraces a multicultural influence, a spectrum of people who consider Appalachia home and/or identify strongly with the trials and triumphs of being of this region. Since 1991, the Affrilachian Poets have been writing together, defying the persistent stereotype of a racially homogenized rural region. Through their writing and the very existence of their enclave, the Affrilachian Poets continue to reveal relationships that link identity to familial roots, socio-economic stratification and cultural influence, and an inherent connection to the land.
“Appalachian American Arab Muslim” Malak Khader“To be an Appalachian American Arab Muslim … that’s a big title. I feel like I’m wearing so many hats at the same time.” Malak Khader of Huntington, West Virginia finds herself constantly fighting stereotypes about her religion and her home state. She started a multiethnic Girl Scout Troop at the Muslim Association of Huntington mosque. “The Girl Scout values align with Islamic values. It teaches you to build your character, it teaches you community service, it teaches you to educate people and be educated yourself.”
Country QueersCountry Queers is an ongoing multimedia oral history project documenting the diverse experiences of rural, small town, and country LGBTQIA2S+ folks – across intersecting layers of identity such as race, class, age, ability, gender identity, and religion.
The STAY ProjectThe STAY Together Appalachian Youth Project is a network of young people, aged 14-30, who are committed to supporting one another to make Appalachia a place we can and want to STAY.
Commentary: My Years of Growing Up Queer in AppalachiaBy Olivia Dowler. July 29, 2021. 100 Days in Appalachia. "Now at almost 20, I watch as legislators across the country debate my rights and the rights of other queer people like me. I watch Arkansas ban gender-affirming healthcare for transgender youth. I watch a bill banning transgender youth from playing on sports teams fly through the West Virginia Legislature, while the Fairness Act – a bill that would add sexual orientation and gender identity to the list of protected classes of people in the state – dies in committee."
TranzmissionEducation, advocacy and support for nonbinary and transgender people in Western North Carolina
Appalachian OUTreachAppalachian OUTreach Mission Statement
Empower, connect, & support the East Tennessee lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender & queer (LGBTQ+) people through the provision of safe & healthy, inclusively welcoming & affirming programs & respect for partnerships, which promote community building, resource development, & education for all.
Appalachian Queer Youth Summit -2022This free camp will bring together young West Virginians either identify as LGBTQ+ or come from LGBTQ+ families from across the state, and give them the tools they need to organize and advocate for the issues they care about.
Rednecks, Queers, and Country Music by Nadine HubbsIn her provocative new book Rednecks, Queers, and Country Music, Nadine Hubbs looks at how class and gender identity play out in one of America's most culturally and politically charged forms of popular music. Skillfully weaving historical inquiry with an examination of classed cultural repertoires and close listening to country songs, Hubbs confronts the shifting and deeply entangled workings of taste, sexuality, and class politics. In Hubbs's view, the popular phrase "I'll listen to anything but country" allows middle-class Americans to declare inclusive "omnivore" musical tastes with one crucial exclusion: country, a music linked to low-status whites. Throughout Rednecks, Queers, and Country Music, Hubbs dissects this gesture, examining how provincial white working people have emerged since the 1970s as the face of American bigotry, particularly homophobia, with country music their audible emblem. Bringing together the redneck and the queer, Hubbs challenges the conventional wisdom and historical amnesia that frame white working folk as a perpetual bigot class. With a powerful combination of music criticism, cultural critique, and sociological analysis of contemporary class formation, Nadine Hubbs zeroes in on flawed assumptions about how country music models and mirrors white working-class identities. She particularly shows how dismissive, politically loaded middle-class discourses devalue country's manifestations of working-class culture, politics, and values, and render working-class acceptance of queerness invisible. Lucid, important, and thought-provoking, this book is essential reading for students and scholars of American music, gender and sexuality, class, and pop culture.
Another Appalachia: Coming up Queer and Indian in a Mountain Place by
"Commands your attention from the first page to the last word." --Morgan Jerkins "I'm glad this memoir exists . . . and I'm especially glad it's so good." --Vauhini Vara, New York Magazine When Neema Avashia tells people where she's from, their response is nearly always a disbelieving "There are Indian people in West Virginia?" A queer Asian American teacher and writer, Avashia fits few Appalachian stereotypes. But the lessons she learned in childhood about race and class, gender and sexuality continue to inform the way she moves through the world today: how she loves, how she teaches, how she advocates, how she struggles. Another Appalachia examines both the roots and the resonance of Avashia's identity as a queer desi Appalachian woman, while encouraging readers to envision more complex versions of both Appalachia and the nation as a whole. With lyric and narrative explorations of foodways, religion, sports, standards of beauty, social media, gun culture, and more, Another Appalachia mixes nostalgia and humor, sadness and sweetness, personal reflection and universal questions.
Rednecks, Queers, and Country Music by
In her provocative new book Rednecks, Queers, and Country Music, Nadine Hubbs looks at how class and gender identity play out in one of America's most culturally and politically charged forms of popular music. Skillfully weaving historical inquiry with an examination of classed cultural repertoires and close listening to country songs, Hubbs confronts the shifting and deeply entangled workings of taste, sexuality, and class politics. In Hubbs's view, the popular phrase "I'll listen to anything but country" allows middle-class Americans to declare inclusive "omnivore" musical tastes with one crucial exclusion: country, a music linked to low-status whites. Throughout Rednecks, Queers, and Country Music, Hubbs dissects this gesture, examining how provincial white working people have emerged since the 1970s as the face of American bigotry, particularly homophobia, with country music their audible emblem. Bringing together the redneck and the queer, Hubbs challenges the conventional wisdom and historical amnesia that frame white working folk as a perpetual bigot class. With a powerful combination of music criticism, cultural critique, and sociological analysis of contemporary class formation, Nadine Hubbs zeroes in on flawed assumptions about how country music models and mirrors white working-class identities. She particularly shows how dismissive, politically loaded middle-class discourses devalue country's manifestations of working-class culture, politics, and values, and render working-class acceptance of queerness invisible. Lucid, important, and thought-provoking, this book is essential reading for students and scholars of American music, gender and sexuality, class, and pop culture.
