american south

Join host Rob Lee as he chats with Brandt Ricca and Matt Miller, the creators of the enchanting series, The Bernice Books. They discuss their entrepreneurial journey, the themes in their books, the influence of the American South, and their upcoming release, Bernice and the Shadow Witch. Tune in for an insightful conversation at the intersection of arts, culture, and community. 📚✨

Episode Highlights:

• Brandt and Matt's background and how The Bernice Books series came to be (00:00:10) 👥 
• The key themes in The Bernice Books series (00:07:24) 📚 
• The recognition and reader responses that have shaped the development of the series (00:18:08) 👏 
• The collaborative process between Brandt and Matt and how it influences the storytelling (00:11:43) 🤝 
• A glimpse into Bernice and the Shadow Witch and what to expect (00:26:09) 🔮 
• Advice for aspiring authors, entrepreneurs, and collaborators (00:30:05) 📢 

Key Takeaways:

• Overcoming adversity, inclusion, self-exploration, and philosophical tones are key themes in The Bernice Books series. 🌈 
• Collaboration and complementary skill sets are essential for successful creative partnerships. 🤝 
• The American South, particularly New Orleans, serves as a rich backdrop for the series, incorporating history, myths, and architecture. 🌆 
• The success of the first book and reader feedback have influenced the direction and development of subsequent books. 📈 
• Enjoy the creative process, be content with the journey, and don't stress about the big picture. ✨ 

Check out The Bernice Books series and follow BarrisBooks on social media for updates and more.
Social Media:
Instagram: barrisbooks
Twitter: @BarrisBooks
Facebook: Barris Books
TikTok: barrisbooks
Others:
Amazon link


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Thank you for being a part of our community! 🎉

This program is supported (in part) by a grant from the Robert W. Deutsch Foundation.

If you have a story about art, culture, or community, share it with us at rob@thetruthinthisart.com for a chance to be featured on 'The Truth In This Art' podcast.

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Original music by Daniel Alexis Music with additional music from Chipzard.

Episode illustration by Alley Kid Art.

About "The Truth In This Art"

"The Truth In This Art," hosted by Rob Lee, is a podcast that explores the essence of creativity and its community impact, amplifying artists' voices and their profound stories.

Connect with me:

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Few authors have changed American culture more than the unparalleled Toni Morrison and the amazing Zora Neale Hurston. This episode of the Velshi Banned Book Club examines two crucial books in the Black literary canon: “Beloved” and “Their Eyes Were Watching God”. Ivy league scholars Dr. Imani Perry and Dr. Eddie Glaude Jr. look at celebrated work “Beloved”, a book that demands you look squarely in the face of not only the institution of slavery in this country, but its continued effect. Then, Dr. Perry and Ibram X. Kendi open the covers of “Their Eyes Were Watching God”, the story of a woman searching for dignity and agency. 

On this day in 1936, the novel “Gone With the Wind” by Margaret Mitchell was first published by the Macmillan Company.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

After his wife dies, country musician Bullet turns to his friend, Tweed, for help restarting their band and advice on raising his two teenaged daughters.

B is for Bisexual - short stories by Laura P. Valtorta

Gertrude Morgan (1900-1980) was a self-taught artist who started painting at 56. In under 20 years, she had completed an estimated 800 pieces and exhibited her work in galleries across the US. 

Special thanks to Mercedes-Benz, our exclusive sponsor this month! From their early days, Mercedes-Benz has built a legacy championing women to achieve the unexpected. Join us all month long as we celebrate women who have led dynamic lives that have shifted, evolved and bloomed, often later in life, eventually achieving the success for which they were destined from the start. 

History classes can get a bad rap, and sometimes for good reason. When we were students, we couldn’t help wondering... where were all the ladies at? Why were so many incredible stories missing from the typical curriculum? Enter, Womanica. On this Wonder Media Network podcast we explore the lives of inspiring women in history you may not know about, but definitely should.

Every weekday, listeners explore the trials, tragedies, and triumphs of groundbreaking women throughout history who have dramatically shaped the world around us. In each 5 minute episode, we’ll dive into the story behind one woman listeners may or may not know–but definitely should. These diverse women from across space and time are grouped into easily accessible and engaging monthly themes like Educators, Villains, Indigenous Storytellers, Activists, and many more.  Womanica is hosted by WMN co-founder and award-winning journalist Jenny Kaplan. The bite-sized episodes pack painstakingly researched content into fun, entertaining, and addictive daily adventures. 

Womanica was created by Liz Kaplan and Jenny Kaplan, executive produced by Jenny Kaplan, and produced by Liz Smith, Grace Lynch, Maddy Foley, Brittany Martinez, Edie Allard, Lindsey Kratochwill, Adesuwa Agbonile, Carmen Borca-Carrillo, Taylor Williamson, Ale Tejeda, Sara Schleede, and Alex Jhamb Burns. Special thanks to Shira Atkins. 

Original theme music composed by Miles Moran.

We are offering free ad space on Wonder Media Network shows to organizations working towards social justice. For more information, please email Jenny at pod@wondermedianetwork.com.

Follow Wonder Media Network:

• Website
• Instagram
• Twitter

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Clementine Hunter (c. 1887-1988) was a prolific painter who didn’t pick up her first paintbrush until her 50s. She’s one of Louisiana’s most celebrated artists. Though she never traveled more than 100 miles from her hometown, her paintings have been displayed in exhibitions and galleries all over the country.

Special thanks to Mercedes-Benz, our exclusive sponsor this month! From their early days, Mercedes-Benz has built a legacy championing women to achieve the unexpected. Join us all month long as we celebrate women who have led dynamic lives that have shifted, evolved and bloomed, often later in life, eventually achieving the success for which they were destined from the start. 

History classes can get a bad rap, and sometimes for good reason. When we were students, we couldn’t help wondering... where were all the ladies at? Why were so many incredible stories missing from the typical curriculum? Enter, Womanica. On this Wonder Media Network podcast we explore the lives of inspiring women in history you may not know about, but definitely should.

Every weekday, listeners explore the trials, tragedies, and triumphs of groundbreaking women throughout history who have dramatically shaped the world around us. In each 5 minute episode, we’ll dive into the story behind one woman listeners may or may not know–but definitely should. These diverse women from across space and time are grouped into easily accessible and engaging monthly themes like Educators, Villains, Indigenous Storytellers, Activists, and many more.  Womanica is hosted by WMN co-founder and award-winning journalist Jenny Kaplan. The bite-sized episodes pack painstakingly researched content into fun, entertaining, and addictive daily adventures. 

Womanica was created by Liz Kaplan and Jenny Kaplan, executive produced by Jenny Kaplan, and produced by Liz Smith, Grace Lynch, Maddy Foley, Brittany Martinez, Edie Allard, Lindsey Kratochwill, Adesuwa Agbonile, Carmen Borca-Carrillo, Taylor Williamson, Ale Tejeda, Sara Schleede, and Alex Jhamb Burns. Special thanks to Shira Atkins. 

Original theme music composed by Miles Moran.

We are offering free ad space on Wonder Media Network shows to organizations working towards social justice. For more information, please email Jenny at pod@wondermedianetwork.com.

Follow Wonder Media Network:

• Website
• Instagram
• Twitter

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The bassist from the band Slaughter. A bona fide New Orleans chef who lost everything in Katrina. A Canadian whose bus shares the same name as our dog. The CEO of the Dollywood Foundation. The Itinerant Air-cooled guy and his friend who runs McIntyre’s Home for Wayward Buses and Wandering Souls. A pastor who owns a wakeboarding ministry and took us in for a week. Two friends who met through their VW club. One of the guys who runs OldVolksTV and saw the new ID Buzz when it premiered. Season five is jammed packed with stories and drops on April 18, 2022.

Oh, and remember Ben from last season—the guy who road tripped with four of his buddies? Well, we caught up with Tom, the ringleader, and got his perspective on the adventure. Check out the entire season as we relay tales from (mostly) the south. 

April, Keri, Stacy, and Chris are back discussing rootwork, hoodoo, and conjure. As well as similarities in other practices around the world.

William Dissen is a renowed chef with 3 popular restaurants in North Carolina.  He’s also known for his efforts to be sustainable.
In this interview Kumarhia and Dissen talk about the love of food, cultural traditions and how to celebrate Thanksgiving without the myth of its origin.

Find out more about Dissen here:
https://marketplace-restaurant.com/chef-william-dissen
https://haymakerclt.com/team/william-dissen/
https://billydschicken.com/

https://twitter.com/chefbillyd?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor
https://www.instagram.com/chefbillyd/?hl=en

Watch William going head to head to Gordon Ramsay here:
https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x82m7zf

www.charukumarhia.com

www.charukumarhia.com

Got a story we should share? Email us: thestorywithcharu@gmail.com
Find us online:
https://charukumarhia.com/
Find us on social media:
https://www.instagram.com/thestorywithcharu/?hl=en
https://twitter.com/CharuK
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC3VqE2HKl-9oNDnhz_xP9dg

"I always say, if you have a brain, if have a body...you have a voice and you can be a leader. And we are all influential in our own networks. - Gigi Pedraza, Founding Executive Director of Latino Community Fund of Georgia

Gigi Pedraza is founding Executive Director of the nonprofit, Latino Community Fund of Georgia. In part two of our conversation, Gigi shares what she loves about living in South including the increasing diversity of people in the region.  She also shares more about the challenges facing nonprofits - from the way the work is perceived to having to face society’s most complex  challenges with limited resources. Gigi invites all of us to become leaders in our own spaces and support the organizations doing impactful work in the Latinx community. 

• Find out more about Latinos for Democracy redistricting work, Un Mapa Para Todos.
• Connect with Latino Community Fund of Georgia and support their work: @lcf_georgia.
• If you missed Part 1 of our conversation, you can listen here: https://bit.ly/GigiPedraza

Thank you for supporting Latina South podcast! Please share the show with a friend or drop us a line: hola@latinasouth.com.

Podcast Music: “The OGS Present Higher” Written by Divinity Roxx, Marcie Chapa, Katty Rodriguez, Nikki Glaspie, Tia Fuller Published by Hot Tottie Music (ASCAP), Wambui Publishing Company, I M A Funkateer (BMI) Used by permission. All rights reserved.

In this episode we have the pleasure of speaking with professor, director, and playwright, Dr. Carlton Molette!

Barbara and Carlton Molette have been Dramatists Guild members since 1971. The
Morehouse-Spelman Players premiered ROSALEE PRITCHETT in 1970. The Negro
Ensemble Company produced the New York premiere In 1971, as well as a revival in 2017
for their 50th anniversary season. ROSALEE PRITCHETT has also been produced by The
FreeSouthern Theatre, several universitytheatres, published byDramatistsPlayService, and
in the anthology Black Writers of America. In 1972, Atlanta University Summer Theatre
premiered DR. B.S. BLACK, a musical collaboration with Charles Mann, with Samuel L.
Jackson as Dr. Black and LaTanya Richardson as his wife before she became his real-life
wife. After Washington, D. C., Houston, and Memphis productions, Theatre of the Stars and
Just Us Theatre produced the musical at Atlanta’s Peachtree Playhouse. BOOJI and NOAH'S
ARK (published in the anthology Center Stage) also premiered in Atlanta in the 1970's.

More recently premieres include: FORTUNES OF THE MOOR (New York’s Frank Silvera
Writers’ Workshop) with additional productions by Ghana’s National Theatre; Chicago’s
ETA Creative Arts; and Brown, Ohio State, Western Michigan, Louisville, Pittsburgh and
Connecticut universities; OUR SHORT STAY (Miami’s M Ensemble); PRUDENCE
(Connecticut Repertory Theatre after Connecticut Commission on Culture and Tourism’s
Playwright Award); LEGACY (Atlanta’s New African Grove after Ethel Woolson Award);
PRESIDENTIAL TIMBER (Houston’s De Luxe Theater). Ten minute plays include: OUT
OF TIME (New York’s Turtle Shell); MOVE THE CAR (Warehouse Performing Arts
Center, NC); TEE SHIRT HISTORY (Atlanta’s Essential Theatre); A FOND FAREWELL
(West Virginia’s Greenbrier Valley Theatre); LAST SUPPER and KIN SHIP (Houston’s
Fade to Black). A reading of ADA’s HUSBAND PASSED won the 2019 “Best of the
Festival Award” at the Atlanta Black Theatre Festival.

Barbara Molette (B.A. Florida A. & M. U.; M.F.A. Florida State U.; Ph.D. U. of Missouri)
Professor Emerita and English Department Chair, Eastern Connecticut State U.; faculty at
Spelman College, Texas Southern U.,Baltimore City Community College (also Director of
WritingAcross the Curriculum); Director of Arts-in-Education Programs, Cityof Baltimore.

Carlton Molette (B.A. Morehouse; M.A., U. of Iowa; Ph.D. Florida State U.) U. of
Connecticut Professor Emeritus; faculty at Spelman College, Florida A. & M., Howard,
Atlanta, Texas Southern Universities; Fine Arts Division Chair, Spelman; School of
Communications Dean, Texas Southern; Arts and Sciences Dean, Lincoln (MO); Vice
President for Academic Affairs, Coppin State (MD).

Learn more about MOJOAA at:

www.MOJOAA.org

Facebook/Instagram: @MOJOAApac

This month, we're going back to school with stories of the most influential women educators in history. 

History classes can get a bad wrap, and sometimes for good reason. When we were students, we couldn’t help wondering... where were all the ladies at? Why were so many incredible stories missing from the typical curriculum? Enter, Encyclopedia Womannica. On this Wonder Media Network podcast we explore the lives of inspiring women in history you may not know about, but definitely should.

Every weekday, listeners explore the trials, tragedies, and triumphs of groundbreaking women throughout history who have dramatically shaped the world around us. In each 5 minute episode, we’ll dive into the story behind one woman listeners may or may not know -- but definitely should. These diverse women from across space and time are grouped into easily accessible and engaging monthly themes like Educators, Villains, Indigenous Storytellers, Activists, and many more. Encyclopedia Womannica is hosted by WMN co-founder and award-winning journalist Jenny Kaplan. The bite-sized episodes pack painstakingly researched content into fun, entertaining, and addictive daily adventures. 

Encyclopedia Womannica was created by Liz Kaplan and Jenny Kaplan, executive produced by Jenny Kaplan, and produced by Liz Smith, Grace Lynch, Maddy Foley, Brittany Martinez, Edie Allard, Lindsey Kratochwill, Sundus Hassan, Adesuwa Agbonile, Carmen Borca-Carrillo, Taylor Williamson, and Ale Tejada. Special thanks to Shira Atkins.

We are offering free ad space on Wonder Media Network shows to organizations working towards social justice. For more information, please email Jenny at pod@wondermedianetwork.com.

Follow Wonder Media Network:

• Website
• Instagram
• Twitter

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Wife: Verlene Oats
Husband: King David Harris
Auto Guy: Christopher Bailey

In this episode we have the pleasure of speaking with actor, writer, director, and playwright Thomas Brazzle!

Thomas Brazzle is an actor, writer and director originally from Texas. He got his start training in child television and commercial performance at KD Studios in Dallas, TX. After spending time studying abroad in London and Barcelona, Thomas returned to the U.S. to focus on creating new work and working in regional theatre. He has performed at The Guthrie in Minneapolis, Shakespeare and Company, Cincinnati Playhouse, Connecticut Rep, The Alley and many other regional theaters. His plays have been selected for readings and workshops nationwide. He is Co-Founder of the award winning production company Whet Ink Productions based in Atlanta, GA that focuses on re-imagining classics and creating new works by artists from marginalized communities. Thomas also teaches theatre performance for high schoolers at The Alliance Theatre in Atlanta, GA and guest lectures at Universities throughout Georgia. He is also the Chair of Programming for the Historic Morton Theatre in Athens, GA. He graduated from Stephen F Austin State University in 2008 with a BFA in Theatre, and in 2014 from The University of Connecticut with a MFA in Acting. (www.thomasbrazzle.com)  

You can find Thomas’ work on his production company’s website whetink.com, learn more about Thomas at thomasbrazzle.com, and follow him on IG at @tbrazzledazzle

Learn more about MOJOAA at:

www.MOJOAA.org

Facebook/Instagram: @MOJOAApac

Michiel Perry is a South Carolina girl who loves all things Southern and stylish.   When she started plannng her Charleston wedding and decorating her first home she realized that there was not enough out there about being Black and Southern - even though most African-Americans can trace their roots in the American South.

That spurred her to create the digital lifestyle brand Black Southern Belle.  Black Southern Belle has been featured on HGTV, Essence, Black Enterprise, Draper James, Apartment Therapy, Brides, Today, Levo League, AOL Lifestyle Collective, and more.  They’ve also done marketing campaigns with Pure Leaf, American Express, Gildan, Walmart, and various Fortune 500 companies.

In this interview Perry talks about how there is more to the American South than meets the eye.

Find more here:
https://blacksouthernbelle.com/about-us-black-southern-belle/

www.charukumarhia.com

www.charukumarhia.com

Got a story we should share? Email us: thestorywithcharu@gmail.com
Find us online:
https://charukumarhia.com/
Find us on social media:
https://www.instagram.com/thestorywithcharu/?hl=en
https://twitter.com/CharuK
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC3VqE2HKl-9oNDnhz_xP9dg

In this episode we have the pleasure of speaking with playwright, professor, and researcher Brittney S. Harris! Listen in as we share our belief in the power of the arts to change hearts and minds, finding stories in our communities and of course, the joys of being a Southern Black theatre maker.

Brittney S. Harris is an Assistant Professor of Theatre in the Department of Communication and Theatre Arts at Old Dominion University. She holds a Master of Fine Arts in Acting from the University of Georgia. Brittney’s research efforts are supported and documented by the practices of PaR (Performance as Research). Her areas of expertise are in Race and Performance, Theatre for Social Change, and performative community-engaged programming.

Throughout the Southeast regions of VA, NC, DC, and GA, Brittney has created several community engagement-based projects and conducted workshops on solo performance development and devised theatre at several national interdisciplinary conferences including the 1st Annual Richmond Fringe Festival, 2020 Mid-America Theatre Conference, Black Theatre Network Annual Conference, and 2019 Gender, Bodies & Technology Conference: TechnoLogics: Power and Resistance. 

 Most recently, her short play The Amazin’ Jason was an official section for the Fade to Black Theatre Festival, Houston TX and she is workshopping and touring her two solo performance projects, The Intersection: The Sandra Bland Project and Being B.A.D.; each project explores the adverse effects of violence in social media on the personal psyche and how narrative-based storytelling is used as a vessel for social resilience and redemption.

You can find Brittney’s work at 

https://brittneysharris.com

Facebook

Learn more about MOJOAA at:

www.MOJOAA.org

Facebook/Instagram: @MOJOAApac

Kevin Beasley thinks a lot about objects. In particular, specific objects that relate to notions of American-ness and Blackness—and ones that are often linked, subtly or not, with violence. Whether with a Cadillac Escalade, a pair of Air Jordans, or an N.F.L. helmet, Beasley finds deep connections to each item he chooses to work with, rigorously studying their multifarious contexts, meanings, and histories. Happy to let artifacts sit in his New York studio for long periods of time, the 36-year-old artist allows them to slowly gestate in his mind until he feels ready to express whatever he has deciphered out of their nature. From there, he turns them into exquisite, alchemical works of art, from tightly packed “slab” sculptures—large, flat resin blocks that embody the density of the symbolic articles that comprise them—to evocative sound installations and performances. 

Beasley’s prolonged approach isn’t mere research; it’s his way of making space to reflect, to pay more attention, and to grapple with the nuances of the complex, loaded subject matter that’s embedded in many of the things that permeate our everyday lives. For Beasley, unpacking subjects charged with underlying connotations is a necessary means for transformation. “You don’t have to fully understand what it is you’re dealing with,” he says. “It takes time. It takes a revisitation. And that’s okay, because that speaks very specifically to a process of learning and understanding.”

Beasley’s work often draws from his personal history, which has included growing up in admiration of the handiwork of his mechanic father, deejaying at house parties at Yale University, and attending annual family reunions in rural Virginia. It was at one such reunion, in 2011, when Beasley came across a cotton field and picked the plant for the first time—an eerie experience that was, as he considered his ancestors and enslaved peoples who once performed the act, all at once distressing, pleasurable, haunting, and illuminating. The following year, Beasley took his fascination with cotton further—and into the deep South. After finding and purchasing a mid-20th-century cotton gin motor on eBay, he drove from New Haven, Connecticut, to a farm in rural Alabama to collect the object. Beginning as part of an M.F.A. project at Yale, the motor would later evolve into an encased artwork, whirling and surrounded by microphones, inside a pristine, clear, soundproof box at the Whitney Museum of American Art—the potent centerpiece of the artist’s breakout exhibition “A View of a Landscape” (2018–2019). (The raw, rancorous noises the motor produced were pumped into an adjacent room that served as a listening gallery.) Later this year, Beasley will extend the project further with a monograph and double LP of the same name, which features sound contributions from artists, musicians, and writers such as Kelsey Lu, Jason Moran, and Fred Moten, whose tracks sample recordings that Beasley made of the churning machine.

On this episode, Beasley talks with Spencer about contemplating these particular objects, sound as a means for greater understanding, and the role of repetition in reshaping history.

In this episode we have the pleasure of speaking with playwright, actor, choreographer and dancer, Tristan André Parks. This conversation is like eavesdropping on your two artsy cousins. We talk about what we are dreaming, how art impacts us and of course, being a Southern Black theatre maker.

Tristan André. Brother. Sun. Black memory cultural worker. Lover of his community. Yes, beloveds. You are that community. Tristan, an alum of the MFA Professional Actor Training Program at UNC-Chapel Hill, is a Southern multi-hyphenate artist whose credits include PlayMakers Repertory Company's Life of Galileo, Sherwood: The Adventures of Robin Hood, Leaving Eden, Twelfth Night and The Crucible, andDC's Shakespeare Theatre Company's production of Baldwin's The Amen Corner. Tristan is represented by About Artists Agency and is a member of Actors' Equity Association. Peace and love to all. 

You can find Tristan’s work at tristanandre.com and follow him on IG at @fishgritsandcollardgreens

Learn more about MOJOAA at:

www.MOJOAA.org

Facebook/Instagram: @MOJOAApac

In this episode we have the pleasure of speaking with playwright and screenwriter, Raven Monroe! We get into about Black girls playing all kinds of roles, writing across genres and mediums and how growing up in the South impacts her work.

Raven Monroe is an actor and playwright from Charlotte, NC. She is a proud graduate of UNC Charlotte (BA ‘16) and NYU Tisch School of the Arts (MFA ‘19) where she honed her skills in the dramatic arts, studying under theatre director Oskar Eustis and playwright Suzan-Lori Parks. As a writer, her intention is to create works that send Black women and girls on adventures, providing representation and showing Black girls that they can be the star of any story. Her works include Mary Davis: Adventures in the Godlands, which was a quarterfinalist at the 2019 Los Angeles International Screenplay Awards, and Sissy & Gen, which is a quarterfinalist in the 2020 Emerging Screenwriters Genre Screenplay Competition. She currently serves as the Vice President on the board of the North Carolina chapter of Women in Film & Television, where she created the bi-weekly live panel “Filmmaker Fridays”, which airs on the NC WiFT Facebook page.

You can find Raven's work on New Play Exchange https://newplayexchange.org/users/36026/raven-monroe

Learn more about MOJOAA at:
www.MOJOAA.org
Facebook/Instagram: @MOJOAApac

For Grammy Award–winning singer and songwriter Rosanne Cash, processing the past is a constant, endless journey. She’d been thinking about race and reparations long before the Movement for Black Lives gained momentum last year, as both racism and African-American ancestry exist in her family history rooted in the American South, where she was born to country music legend Johnny Cash and his first wife, Vivian Liberto, in 1955. Cash channeled her anguish into “The Killing Fields,” a haunting single that reckons with the United States’s legacy of lynchings, and “Crawl into the Promised Land,” a blistering yet optimistic response to the tumultuous events of 2020. Last month, she released both tracks on a seven-inch limited-edition vinyl, the sales from which will benefit the Arkansas Peace and Justice Memorial Movement, a nonprofit that raises awareness about the state’s history of racial injustice.  

Over the last four decades, Cash, who now lives in New York, has established herself as one of the rare voices in popular music who sings from the uncut perspective of a grown woman, fraught with opinions, mixed emotions, and battle scars. With each album she releases (there are 14 to date), she seems to gain a deeper understanding of herself. After earning 11 number one hits on Billboard’s country music chart during the 1980s, Cash released Interiors (1990), a dark, reflective album that marked a departure from her commercial work. While country radio stations and her label all but ignored the record, she’s embraced the honest, deeply personal approach used to make it as her modus operandi ever since. 

Her recent work is increasingly intimate: Cash confronts her Southern roots and grapples with her life as a wife, mother, and former country star in the 2014 album The River and The Thread; her 2018 album She Remembers Everything—released against the backdrop of Brett Kavanaugh’s Supreme Court confirmation hearings and during the rise of the #MeToo movement—tackles the plight of women in America with songs about divorce, ingrained social hierarchies, and death, including a track about a boy killed by gun violence told from the viewpoint of his mother. She has also written articles for The Atlantic, The Nation, and The New York Times about subjects that matter to her, such as the need for country music artists to speak out in support of gun control. Eschewing any self-righteousness, these efforts, whether singing, songwriting, or prose, are her way of working through the complexities of life. “I have to keep showing up for the things I believe in,” she says, noting that she often feels like a fraud. “That’s part of being an artist. You come up against that, and you still show up, because you have to. The world needs it.” 

On this episode, Cash discusses what it means to reckon with history, talking with Andrew about her long-standing work as an activist, the healing power of music, and continually revisiting the past as a means for personal and artistic evolution.