Rhodes Institute for Regional Studies

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This collection includes papers and projects completed by students as part of their participation in the Rhodes Institute for Regional Studies. The collection includes over 150 papers, documentary videos, and art projects related to the Memphis and Mid-South area in a wide variety of disciplines, including: African American Studies, Archaeology, Education, Gender Studies, History, Music, Political Science, and Religious Studies.

The Rhodes Institute is an innovative program that capitalizes on the liberal arts tradition of the College, the research expertise of its faculty, and its location in one of America’s great cities. All Rhodes Institute fellows receive housing, research expenses, and $3,000 stipends while they pursue their academic work. Over the course of the program, Institute fellows spend their first week together engaged in an intensive regional studies seminar; six weeks working on their own projects, interspersed with weekly group meetings; and a final week presenting and discussing their research. By the end of the program, all fellows submit research papers and reports on their work.

In addition, Rhodes Institute fellows will be encouraged to continue their research beyond the summer by enrolling in a directed inquiry, pursuing an honors research project, or preparing their research for publication.

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Recent Submissions

  • Publication
    The Southern Rural Cemetery: Using Grave Symbolism to Analyze Reactions to Epidemic Death in the Nineteenth Century
    (2021-08-01) Mueller, Elizabeth
    In the mid-nineteenth century, the American rural cemetery movement moved beyond the Northeast and permeated the South with garden landscapes and Victorian symbolism. Culture and experience distinctively shaped Southern portrayal of the movement’s hallmarks. The South’s relationship to death through war, epidemic, racial and economic strife transformed not only the rural cemetery’s landscape and symbolism but also the South’s attitudes towards mortality. Existing literature does not acknowledge how events of overwhelming death affected the movement’s romanticized views of death. Asa case study, this paper applies a code of symbolism to analyze grave markers at Elmwood Cemetery in Memphis, Tennessee and compares changes over time with first-person accounts of the 1878 yellow fever epidemic. This research has current implications because it studies people’s relationship to death in response to a severe epidemic—a reflection of how COVID-19 might change how we know and treat death in the future.
  • Publication
    The Plague Within the Pandemic: COVID-19 and the School-Prison Pipeline
    (2021-07-31) Victorian, Mi'Destini
    Since March of 2020 COVID-19 has affected the lives of many around the world and continues to do so, even as the world has reopened for the conduction of business. Considering how in the United States specific marginalized communities have endured a history of dehumanization and destruction, this current state breeds alarm for how Black children’s education, youth, and innocence is up for grabs by those designing and maintaining systems of inequality. Proceeding in colorblind ideologies with an absence of necessary, honest conversations, this country refuses to take responsibility for the livelihood of Black bodies and them being funneled through the School-Prison Pipeline. As a result, Black children attending schools in low-income communities are at risk as existing elements of inequity and disparity are exasperated during this time. Through review of literature and survey data, I use this research to bring light on how we are living in the wake of continuous violence while systemic transformation should bea priority. This work highlights an issue between the educational and criminal justice systems that could otherwise be faded into the background as the world continues to resist the holistic humanization of Black bodies.
  • Publication
    A Look into the Health Inequalities for Latinx and Hispanic Communities in Memphis During the Covid-19 Pandemic
    (2021-08-10) Feniger, Kylie
    Health disparities have been an ongoing issue many citizens in the United States are forced to deal with due to limited access to healthcare facilities, the high cost of medical care, and the societal racism embedded into our society. The Covid-19 Pandemicexposed many of the existing issues marginalized groups of individuals continue to go through due to the way they are valued in a capitalist society. In Memphis, a predominantly black city, the Latinx and Hispanic communities tend to be overlooked, generating an even greater divide between those provided with the necessary tools to endure the pandemic and those forced to survive on their own1. This research aims to provide background information on the unequal distribution of healthcare services and expound upon how America dealt with the pandemic and how we could have responded differently. By using interviews and personal narratives from the Latinx and Hispanic community in Memphis, this study centers around the individualized experiences many faced during the pandemic. Incorporating both aggregate and personalized qualitative data aims to promote social awareness and change for more equitable health care access and information for all groups of people
  • Publication
    The Most Charitable City: How the Non-Profit Industrial Complex Maintains Structural Inequity in Memphis, TN
    (2021-08-01) Mayeux, Allison G.
    Scholars, activists, and organizers understand the non-profit industrial complex (NPIC) as the overlapping interests of the capitalist state, local governments, individuals, private entities, and nonprofits themselves in maintaining the structural power that they each hold in our society. As of 2017, the Chronicle of Philanthropydeemed the city of Memphis the most charitable in the nation, so it is worth exploring how the NPIC functions to maintain the racial capitalist power structure that initially produces such vast inequality in the city. An abundance of research relates to the social service sector, yet a majority of this literature does not provide explicit critiques of the non-profit system as it relates to racial capitalism, nor does it provide a framework for understanding how nonprofits are a necessary tool of the capitalist state. Understanding the contours of the NPIC is vital in grasping the role that non-profit organizations have in upholding systemic inequality in a city so desperately reliant on them for survival. I examined existing literature around the non-profit system and its relationship with neoliberalism and racial capitalism and applied this theoretical framework to Memphis non-profit organizations. By exploring the ways in which nonprofits function under neoliberalism, I theorize why the non-profit sector holds a critical role in the maintenance of inequality and why it is not capable of producing radical transformation.
  • Publication
    Walker Ave
    (2021-08-03) Walker, Grayson
    This project, Walker Ave, is my love letter to Memphis, Memphis music, and Memphis musicians. As an outsider originally from Colorado, I have teamed up with local musicians and producers to help capture the “Memphis Sound”—samples from Memphis musicians like Three Six Mafia, “scary” synthesized strings, quick hi-hat patterns on the Roland TR-808 drum machine (or synthesized version of the “808”), Blues themes and chord progressions, and the dialectic slang and accent unique to the region can all be responsible for a Memphis musical identity. Despite Memphis often being described in the news as a dangerous cesspit of an inner city buoyed only by the prevalent positive advertisement of the histories of Elvis Presley and the blues, the city of Memphis creates music that influences and inspires musicians across place and time. In hip hop specifically, Three Six Mafia created a unique form of southern trap characterized by sampling, “scary” synth strings, dark, brooding keyboard lines, trap hi-hats, triplet rhythms, and 808 drum lines that is constantly innovated and embellished upon by Memphis’ new generation of rappers and producers. New-age artists like Moneybagg Yo, Young Dolph, Key Glock, Duke Deuce, and Pooh Shiesty team up with producers like Tay Keith, HitKidd, RealRed, and TP808s to continually evolve the “classic” 808 drum sounds and beats and utilize the typical synth sounds, but in new ways—infusing their own individual styles and voices into the current version of the “Memphis Sound.” As a result of the stereotypical view of Memphis as crime-ridden and unremarkable (a perspective motivated by its demographics as one of the few majority-Black cities in the country), evidenced by its label as “the most dangerous city in America” according to U.S. News and its low quality of life rankings on travel sites, very little credit is given to individuals, organizations, and creatives in the city. Music is a large part of both the illness (in that the benevolent focus on Presley discredits other music from the city) and the remedy in this sense, and by exposing and promoting the unique and remarkable musical characteristics of Memphis, I believe this image can be shifted. The negative connotations typically associated with the city can be racist and harmful in many ways, but with music as a vehicle this project serves to push back again those narratives and educate outsiders on the groundbreaking and trendsetting nature of Memphis music of all genres.
  • Publication
    Spotlighting African-American Liberation and Resistance in Black Theatre
    (2018-07-01) Curry, Alea L.; Hughes, Charles L.
    (Paper) Exploration of theatrical Space for African Americans in Memphis, especially via the Hattiloo Theatre.
  • Publication
    The Memphis Sound: A Journey Through a Wave of Music
    (2018-07-01) Moore, Andre M.; Bass, John B. III
  • Publication
    A White Man's World: The Sexual Exploitation of Enslaved Women in the Urban Deep South
    (2018-07-01) Eiland, Sarah W.; Loynes, Duane T.
    In the nineteenth century southern United States the role of the female slave had a dual nature. Enslaved women played an important role in the daily operations of domestic life and were typically used to provide labor in spheres that were not particularly physically demanding. Added to their roles as domestic laborers, enslaved women were often expected to, by virtue of their bodies, perpetuate slavery and improve the lives of white slaveholding men. For slave owners, the inherent value of enslaved women was connected to their reproductive abilities. White slave traders and white slave owners often exploited female slaves for their own monetary or personal gain. To explore the experiences of enslaved women who lived in the urban Deep South, the slave trade and population of four regionally important cities will be discussed. Memphis, Tennessee; Nashville, Tennessee; Vicksburg, Mississippi; and Mobile, Alabama, were each home to large slave populations and booming slave trades. The lives of women enslaved in these urban environments were inherently different from their plantation counterparts. The density of urban environments and the organization of domestic urban slavery allowed white men uninterrupted access to the women of color they owned. This allowed for the exertion of physical dominance over enslaved women which often ended in sexual violence. Due to the urban living structure, enslaved women in Memphis, Nashville, Vicksburg, and Mobile experienced a considerable amount of sexual assault at the hands of their owners. Evidence of this sexual exploitation and abuse is attested to in the businesses records of the slave trade, former slaves' personal accounts of mistreatment, and can be inferred from the population statistics of mixed-race slave populations present in all four cities.
  • Publication
    Growing the Pie: The Exploration of the Social Impacts of Black Owned Business in the Development of Memphis
    (2018-07-01) Burgess, Brian; McKinney, Charles W.
    (Paper) The impact of which Black ownded business has had on Memphis in the past and in the contemporary moment.
  • Publication
    Ideologies of Control: Understanding the Discourse of Intimate Partner Violence in Memphis
    (2018-07-01) McCarty, Hannah E.; Hughes, Charles L.
    Intimate partner violence (IPV) is a major social and public health issue that affects millions of people in the United States, particularly in the city of Memphis, which possesses some of the highest rates of IPV in the country. Though women of color, poor women, and members of the LGBTQ+ community are disproportionately impacted by intimate partner violence, the dominant model of intervention services operates on a guise of colorblindness while primarily catering to the needs of white, heterosexual, cis, middle class feminine victims. Using an intersectional feminist lens, I problematize this current model and employ a historical review of the political advocacy of the Women's Shelter Movement to investigate how white, middle class women became the model victims of intimate partner violence. I argue that intimate partner violence continues to be a major issue in the city of Memphis, over thirty years since the Women's Shelter Movement, because of the way in which Women's Shelter advocates developed an incomplete discourse of understanding intimate partner violence and the way in which advocates across the country and specifically in Memphis appealed to Southern ideologies that dictate who is a victim and who is not.
  • Publication
    Good Intentions: A Look into Memphis's Nonprofit Sector
    (2018-07-01) Burkhead, Emily J.; McKinney, Charles W.
    Due to its high poverty rates, Memphis is home to over one-thousand nonprofit organizations. Since the 1960s, the sector has grown into a 'nonprofit industrial complex.' The city seems to not only embrace its charitable tendencies; it relies on them. This piece explores the Memphis sector and how it causes and is created by socioracial inequities within the city. This piece not only provides a snapshot into what the nonprofit sector is like but how it can be improved through proper racial representation and creating partnerships instead of paternalistic infiltration.
  • Publication
    Memphis Electronic Music: Finding Soul in the Age of Lifeless Machines
    (2018-07-01) Tate, Marcus; Bass, John B. III
    This project consists of two parts: researching the relationship between Memphis and Electronic Music and building an analog synthesizer. This project also explores how electronics are used as tools for creating art and how Memphians use electronics to create their own unique sound.
  • Publication
    Examining the Shelby County Schools Optional Program: Barriers to Black Student Enrollment in Shelby County Schools
    (2018-07-01) Scott, Christal N.; McKinney, Charles W.
    Memphis has a long-standing history of segregation, most notably within its school system. The struggle to achieve an equitable education has been interrupted by issues of white flight, busing, school privatization, cultural competency, and so on. Segregation in Memphis's schools can be boiled down to many issues; however, this paper will be taking a closer examination of the Shelby County Schools Optional Program and locating the barriers to black student enrollment in AP/Honors classes within its system. The lack of discussion around the necessity of optional schools and its role in perpetuating barriers to black student enrollment in AP/Honors classes is alarming. This paper will expand on the national dilemma of magnet and optional schools and AP courses, and will situate Memphis in the middle of this national debate. By reflecting on the history of optional schools in Memphis, expertise of SCS officials, and the lived experienced of both teacher and student, there is hope that conversations about the Optional Program and educational equity for black students will begin.
  • Publication
    Arriving in Memphis: the ESL education experience among refugees
    (Memphis, Tenn. : Rhodes College, 2017) Bishop, August; Yu, Shaolu
    This paper explores the English as a second language (ESL) education among adult refugees who have arrived in Memphis, Tennessee within the last twenty years. The research is based on an eight-week ethnography and interviews. By investigating the experiences of both ESL teachers and adult refugee students, this paper will demonstrate challenges that Memphis refugees face including a lack of time, resources, and confidence on their way to becoming proficient in English.This paper will conclude with strategies to combat future refugee resettlement challenges, including an increase in collaboration within the city and the refugee organizations,an increase in funding, and an increase in cultural sensitivity among the Memphis community.
  • Publication
    When D.C. Came to the Delta
    (Memphis, Tenn. : Rhodes College, 2017) Walter, Jeffrey; McKinney, Charles W.
    (Documentary film) Delta since 1967.
  • Publication
    RAÍCES: Testimonios on Music and Danza en Memphis
    (Memphis, Tenn. : Rhodes College, 2017) Mercado, Aylen; Chaddock, Noelle
    Podcast: Latinx Identity and the arts.
  • Publication
    Not Contemporary to Me: Memphis Churches and the Power of Musical Reformations
    (Memphis, Tenn. : Rhodes College, 2017) Moore, Sean; Bass, John B. III
    Gospel/Soul music.
  • Publication
    Teaching the Memphis Sound: An Exploration of the City’s Music Education
    (Memphis, Tenn. : Rhodes College, 2017) Danielson, Rosetta (Etta); Person, Natalie K.
    History of Music Education in Memphis.
  • Publication
    “To Wear the Livery of a State that Distrusts Us” African American Militias and Disenfranchisement in Memphis 1878-1892.
    (Memphis, Tenn. : Rhodes College, 2017) Johnson, Roger; Saxe, Robert F.
    Yellow Fever.
  • Publication
    Keep The Tradition Alive: An Examination of Division in the Memphis Music Scene
    (Memphis, Tenn. : Rhodes College, 2017) Robinson, Nathan; Bass, John B. III
    City-wide musical audit or survey.
All materials in this collection are copyrighted by Rhodes College and subject to Title 17 of the U.S. Code. This documentation is provided for online research and access purposes only. Permission to use, copy, modify, distribute and present this material, without fee, and without written agreement, is hereby granted for educational, non-commercial purposes only. The Rhodes College Archives reserves the right to decide what constitutes educational and commercial use. In all instances of use, acknowledgement must be given to Rhodes College Archives and Special Collections, Memphis, TN. For information regarding permission to publish this material, please email the Archives at archives@rhodes.edu.