With Good Reason

A Confederacy of Dunces, by New Orleans-born John Kennedy Toole, is one of the great stories of American literature. Published almost 12 years after his tragic suicide, the book went on to win the Pulitzer Prize and became a modern classic. Cory MacLauchlin’s (Germanna Community College) new biography of Toole, Butterfly in the Typewriter, tells [...]

Brain injury is more common than you might think.  1.5 million people suffer an injury each year in this country alone.  Michael Friedlander is the director of the Virginia Tech Carilion Research Institute, where they’re looking for ways to help the brain heal itself.  He studies individual nerve cells and says that by stimulating a [...]

Over the past decade, Mexican drug traffickers trying to get their products to the U.S. have had a spiritual “protector.” Her name is Santa Muerte, and she’s a Mexican folk saint for not just drug traffickers, but prostitutes too. R. Andrew Chesnut (Virginia Commonwealth University) is the author of a new book about Santa Muerte, [...]

You can’t see them on the surface. But at the bottom of some of the world’s largest bodies of water are areas called dead zones where fish and other life can’t survive. Robert Diaz (College of William & Mary) tracks the development of these dead zones, which are rapidly increasing. He says agricultural runoff and [...]

Studies show that women in academia are often relegated to lower-ranked positions while their male counterparts ascend to the top. Khadijah Miller (Norfolk State University) says finding a balance between work and home life can be stressful. So she helped form the Sistah Colleague Circle to give women encouragement, support, and a collaborative work environment. [...]

National interest in the spiritual practices and beliefs of our presidents is as strong as ever.  In his new book, The Faiths of the Postwar Presidents, David Holmes (College of William and Mary) looks at the role of religion in the lives of the twelve presidents who have served since the end of World War [...]

The fear of public speaking can be debilitating.  For some, it’s the stuff of nightmares.  And so rather than stumble through a speech, many people avoid doing it altogether. But Molly Bishop Shadel (University of Virginia) and Robert N. Sayler (University of Virginia) say oral advocacy is key to a healthy democracy. Effective speeches can [...]

Have you ever wanted to create your own television series? Kathryn O’Sullivan (Northern Virginia Community College) and her husband Paul Awad did just that—only they aired their Western soap online. The award-nominated series is called Thurston, and it’s one of many new independent productions in the emerging genre of web television. And: We’ll speak with [...]

Appalachia is often imagined as rural and white, but a new wave of African-American writers is challenging the notion of a single Appalachian region and culture. They call themselves Affrilachians. Joanne Gabbin is the director of the Furious Flower Poetry Center at James Madison University. She brought Affrilachian poets from across the country to her [...]

The Victorians photographed their dead before burial.  Abraham Lincoln’s death might have popularized embalming.  Some people today have their ashes made into diamonds. Bernard Means (Virginia Commonwealth University) studies how and why we bury our dead – and how that’s changed over the last few centuries. Plus: A trip to some orphan graveyards – forgotten places [...]