Hands-on Appalachian Studies

In the summer of 2018, I sponsored an ethnographic field school in southern West Virginia. Ten graduate students attended the program which included interviewing nearly 30 residents of Charleston, Logan and Mingo counties, as well as visiting important historical and tourist locations in the area. Students read regional histories and studied recent economic and social events, like the decline of coal, the rise of fracking, and the 55 Strong Teachers strike. The students completed oral histories and a formal documentation project for the class. But the significance of the project was that students came away with a nuanced understanding of the people and social context, much more than they could have learned in class. This presentation will explore the benefits and challenges the field school model for educating, not only students, but life-long adults learner, investors, and business owners and tourism officials about the unique features of the region

From Yellow Ribbons to Bridging the Community: The Transformation of Local Identity in a Pennsylvania Mexican Settlement Community

Since the passage of the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 (IRCA), Mexican farmworkers who were formerly seasonal migrants have been settling in greater numbers out of the traditional "gateway" states of California, Texas and Illinois. These "new destination" communities typically do not have a long-term history of Mexican settlement. Like many of these new settlement communities, Kennett Square Pennsylvania, the "Mushroom Capital of the World," has hosted Mexican farmworkers for nearly thirty years. For most of that time, Mexicans living on the periphery of this prosperous town were scarcely noticeable. This has been changing gradually since the early 1990s, as a steady increase of Mexican families have decided to make Kennett Square their permanent home. This population, once nearly invisible, is now one of the defining characteristics of Kennett identity.</jats:p

Newcomers to an Old Town: The Legacy of the “Back to the Land” movement in Berkeley Springs, WV

Berkeley Springs is known as “America’s First Spa;” a resort frequented by George Washington and Lord Fairfax. In the 1970s a number of “back to the land” newcomers moved into the area, making major investments in Berkeley Springs’ downtown businesses, tourism and arts economies. These newcomers have taken on leadership roles that have helped shape Berkeley Springs into the desirable tourist destination we know today. Last May a fire along the premier commercial street that borders Berkeley Springs State Park destroyed a major building and kept the street blocked for most of the summer. Some merchants describe it as the event that “killed the summer season.” The building’s owner, a retiree who was one of the original back to the landers, decided to sell the property rather than rebuild. While understandable, his decision has many in the community worried: will someone be able to buy the property and rebuild? As the back-to the landers prepare for retirement, there are broader questions about the next generation of community development and leadership. Most local residents don’t have the capital to buy properties that were bought and developed in the 70s. This presentation explores the legacy of the back to the land movement in Berkeley Springs and the relationships of newcomers and locals has evolved in the last forty years

Bodies in motion: Mexican migration, embodied experience and the sense of place

The significance of embodied experiences in the development of locality is an undertheorized area in folklore and cultural studies. I define locality as state of belonging that is primarily relational and constituted through shared meanings and a sense of social alliance. This study is an analysis of how embodied experiences shape the production of locality for Mexican women and men who have settled in the United States (U.S.) in the years since the passage of the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA). More specifically, it maps particular embodied experiences and bodily praxis as they intersect with issues of settlement, displacement and social action in the shifting cultural landscape of a Mexican settlement community in Kennett Square, Pennsylvania. As a legislative event, the IRCA was a watershed in the history of U.S. immigration; it provided amnesty and legal residency for previously undocumented laborers throughout the U.S., the majority of whom were Mexican nationals. As a result, IRCA permanently altered Mexican migration and settlement patterns. It has facilitated the establishment of Mexican communities in locales that historically have not experienced permanent settlement from Mexico. These communities challenge conventional understandings of Mexican settlement and adaptation because these areas do not provide access to long-standing social networks and the associated social and cultural capital that is a common feature in California, Texas and Illinois, the historic “gateway” states of Mexican migration and settlement. Drawing upon the example of Kennett Square, I argue that these recent post-IRCA Mexican settlements require a re-evaluation of ethnographic inquiries that seek to understand community formation and group cohesion. In post-IRCA settlements, an English-speaking citizen population is likely to dominate the local social scene, and often limits overt or public expressions of cultural identity and locality production by their Mexican neighbors. As such, these communities necessitate a reconsideration of the indicators of community formation. In the case of Kennett Square, narrative accounts of embodied experiences coupled with bodily praxis provide insight into cultural productions that would otherwise be overlooked