‘Delta Jewels’ Author Visits Atlanta Book Club Conference | WABE 90.1 FM
Related Program: 
City Lights with Lois Reitzes

‘Delta Jewels’ Author Visits Atlanta Book Club Conference

By Wendy Parker • Aug 6, 2015

 

Leola Dillard, a centenarian from Yazoo City, Miss;, is one of more than women featured in the book '''Delta Jewels.''
Credit Alysia Burton Steele

Last month on “City Lights,” host Lois Reitzes talked with photojournalist Alysia Burton Steele about her recent book exploring the lives of several dozen elderly African-American women in Mississippi.

Photojournalist and professor Alysia Burton Steele, author of ''Delta Jewels,'' interviewed on ''City Lights.''
Credit Charles W. Jones / WABE

Steele visited WABE studios for an extended conversation with Reitzes about “Delta Jewels: In Search of My Grandmother’s Wisdom,” which has received nationwide acclaim. Steele, a former photographer for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, now teaches at the University of Mississippi.

She will be among the speakers at this weekend’s National Book Club Conference in Buckhead, and will return to Atlanta on Sept. 4 for the Decatur Book Festival.

Tags: 
Alysia Burton Steele
Delta Jewels
African-American women
National Book Club Conference
Decatur Book Festival
City Lights

Related Content

‘Delta Jewels’ Tells Poignant Tales Of Southern Black Women

By Wendy Parker • Jul 14, 2015
Alysia Burton Steele

Last month’s deadly shootings at Charleston's Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church have led many Americans to reconsider racial relations and their own complicated views on the subject.

Even before the Confederate battle flag finally came down over the South Carolina state capitol, a rash of fires broke out at predominantly black churches across the South.  

Those events prompted “City Lights” host Lois Reitzes to read "Delta Jewels," a book published in April by photojournalist Alysia Burton Steele.

10th Annual Decatur Book Festival Schedule Released

By Wendy Parker • Jul 28, 2015
TimothyJ / flickr.com/tjc

 

Bookworms get ready.

On Tuesday, the full schedule was released for the 10th annual Decatur Book Festival, sponsored by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

The theme for this year’s festival, which take place Sept. 4-6 in downtown Decatur, is “Read Different,” urging book lovers to “read beyond what you normally do,” especially as it relates to race, gender, form and genre.

What Writer Flannery O'Connor Can Teach Us About Pants

By Gabbie Watts • Aug 3, 2015
In an exhibit at Andalusia Farms, Flannery O'Connor's fashion life is on display, including some of her mother's pattern books. Called "Flannery and Fashion at Mid-Century," the exhibit runs through Nov. 1.
Courtesy of Elizabeth Wylie

Flannery O’Connor died 51 years ago today.

Her legacy can teach us a lot about Southern Gothic literature, morality and Catholicism, and, believe it or not, she can teach us a thing or two about fashion.

Take her popular short story “A Good Man Is Hard to Find.” Written in the perspective of a grandmother, a family travels from Atlanta to Florida.