By Sarah Geegan

The UK Appalachian Center will sponsor an event honoring the contributions of Kate Black as an Appalachian Studies archivist and scholar who retired from the UK library faculty in January. The event will take place from 3:30-5 p.m. Monday, April 8, at the University of Kentucky Good Barn.

Several distinguished scholars will speak at the event, including Anne Shelby, an Appalachian writer; Dwight Billings a UK professor of sociology; Mary Anglin a UK associate professor of anthropology; and Gurney Norman a UK associate professor of English, will read from his work, and Nyoka Hawkins.

UK Libraries Dean Terry Birdwhistell and

By Whitney Hale, Mack McCormick

University Press of Kentucky (UPK) author bell hooks has been named the recipient of the 2013 Black Caucus of the American Library Association’s (BCALA) Best Poetry Award for her book "Appalachian Elegy: Poetry and Place."

The BCALA Literary Awards recognize excellence in adult fiction, nonfiction, poetry and publishing by African American authors published during the previous year, including an award for Best Poetry and a citation for Outstanding Contribution to Publishing. The award will be presented to hooks at the Annual Conference of the American Library Association

The James S. Brown Award is given to honor the memory of Professor James S. Brown, a sociologist on the faculty of the University of Kentucky from 1946 to 1982, whose pioneering studies of society, demography, and migration in Appalachia (including his ethnography of “Beech Creek”) helped to establish the field of Appalachian Studies at U.K. and beyond.

The Award supports graduate student research on the Appalachian region. To be eligible, students must be actively enrolled in a master’s or doctoral degree program at U.K. The Award must be used to meet costs of doing research relevant to social life in Appalachia including travel, lodging, copying, interviewing, ethnography, data collection, archival research, transcribing, and other legitimate research expenses. Except under special circumstances, awards will not exceed $1,500. The award does not cover registration or travel

The University of Kentucky Appalachian Center announces the following internship opportunities for the spring semester, for undergraduate or graduate students. Each internship is for 10 hours per week, with $10/hr. compensation. Students from all colleges at UK are encouraged to apply, and there is special emphasis on providing this opportunity to UK students who are from the Appalachian region.

The Appalachian Center (http://appalachiancenter.as.uky.edu)  emphasizes community-university partnerships in shaping research and engagement that is useful in and beyond the region, in keeping with the land grant mission of the University. Our role is to facilitate stronger connections between student and faculty researchers from across all colleges at the University of Kentucky whose teaching, research, learning and outreach includes

by Carl Nathe

University of Kentucky doctoral candidate and Letcher County native Amanda Fickey is the recipient of a research fellowship from the Central Appalachian Institute in Research and Development (CAIRD).  CAIRD is a nonprofit, public policy organization, which provides long-term educational and economic developmental strategies in order to establish vibrant and sustainable communities that will improve the quality of life for citizens of central Appalachia.  Fickey will serve as a fellow-in-residence for a year-long appointment in 2013.  CAIRD is located in the heart of the Central Appalachian region in Pikeville.

"We are delighted to have a person of Amanda's talent and proven research background helping us in the coming year," said Jason Belcher, CEO of CAIRD.  "Her combination of scholarly achievement and work experience in Appalachia is ideally

by Derrick Meads & Sarah Geegan

An exhibit titled “Interwoven: Rural Traditions, Modern Ties ~ Baskets from Appalachia and the Andes” will showcase more than 100 pieces of basketry from Ecuador and Appalachia at the Lexington Public Library’s Central Gallery.

The wide-ranging exhibit of baskets opened Nov. 3, and spans from Nov. 12-16. A reception will be held at 5 p.m. on Friday, Nov. 16, at the gallery, during the final day of UK’s "International Education Week.”

The Ecuadorian work ranges from baskets made by Huaorani and Kichwa indigenous groups in the Amazon Basin and Andean highland, to modern pieces collected in major cities. The Appalachian exhibited works also span across white oak baskets to modern contemporary craft.

In early 2012 the U.S. Embassy in Quito, Ecuador, invited

By Sarah Geegan & Ann Kingsolver

The UK Appalachian Center  and the Appalachian Studies Program will host scholars, artists and NGO representatives from mountain regions all over the world on Oct. 25-27. This Global Mountain Regions conference, free and open to the public, will be focused on comparing notes across mountain regions on several continents as residents of those regions look to the future.

Each day, Thursday-Saturday, 8-5 p.m.  in the William T. Young Library auditorium, presenters from Appalachia and from other mountain regions in Indonesia, Ecuador, Wales, India, Mexico, Italy, China, Sri Lanka, Mali, Canada, the U.

In November, the James W. Stuckert Career Center assembled a UK team to participate in the Clinton Global Initiative University, a program through which university students propose solutions to the world's humanitarian problems. While each of the students came from different backgrounds, from the College of Arts and Sciences to the 

By Sarah Geegan

The Appalachian Center and the University Press of Kentucky are hosting three events Friday, April 20, to celebrate Appalachia-related books published during this academic year.

The events, which will take place both at Memorial Hall and the Appalachian Center, honor books that contribute to the understanding of the Appalachian region and were published by UK faculty or by the University Press of Kentucky during this academic year.

Helen Lewis and Judi Jennings will give an Appalachian forum based on their new book, "Helen Matthews Lewis: Living Social Justice in Appalachia," at 3:30 p.m. in Memorial Hall.