Two Meek School faculty members have articles in the recently released New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture volume on the media.
Professor Joseph Atkins contributed an article on how the press has covered labor in the South historically and today. Dr. Kathleen Wickham wrote a biography on Clarion-Ledger investigative reporter Jerry Mitchell. In both cases the entries represent the research interests of Atkins and Wickham.
Atkins, a professor of journalism, writes on labor issues in the South and is the author of “Covering for the Bosses: Labor and the Southern Press”
Wickham, an associate professor, has previously written a book on how The Clarion-Ledger won a Pulitzer Prize in 1983 for its coverage of education reform legislation. She is currently working on a book about the reporters who were on campus during the1962 integration crisis.
A review in Journalism and Mass Communication Quarterly said the volume’s strength is in its “expansiveness” and that is “an irreplaceable reference tool” for scholars conducting research on media figures. The reviewer cites Wickham as one of the media scholars worth noting, along with E. Culpepper Clark of the University of Georgia and Michael Fuhlhage and Lucila Vargas of UNC-Chapel Hill.
The volume contains more than 130 articles and 40 thematic essays. The encyclopedia is a project of the Center for Southern Studies at Ole Miss.
