Yale University is convening a conference this weekend featuring rural voices taking on corporate power and lack of competition in the agriculture and food system. The event will feature academics, researchers, and investigative journalists who have a much more difficult time discussing these issues openly in agribusiness-friendly states in the Midwest and West, according to […]
Posted inArts and Culture
Art Project Involving All Fifty States Finds Home in Rural Connecticut
The American Mural Project (AMP) is a giant endeavor located in a small town. Twenty-two years in the making, the multimillion-dollar project is the world’s largest indoor collaborative artwork at five stories high and 120 feet long. The project is a tribute to working people in the United States and encompasses a flourishing educational program […]
Posted inGrowth and Development
Commentary: Community Organizations Work Best
This story was originally published by The Roanoke Times. In a Kentucky coalfield county that twice gave Trump 79% of its vote, volunteer fire chief Bill Meade is known as a particularly outspoken Trump supporter. When we invited him to meet with grassroots leaders at the oldest African American social organization in Baltimore, some people […]
Posted inCoronavirus
Fauci: Dark Months Ahead; Rural Residents Should Focus on Prevention
Infectious disease expert Anthony Fauci, M.D., says rural Americans need to double-down on measures to prevent the spread of Covid-19, lest a surge in patients overwhelm rural hospitals. Fauci, director of the National institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said rural areas can expect January and February to be difficult months for the pandemic. He […]
Posted inGrowth and Development
Commentary: It’s Time for the Hillbilly Highway to Become a Two-Way Road
In his book, Hillbilly Elegy (now a major motion picture streaming on Netflix), J.D. Vance references the so-called “Hillbilly Highway.” The “Highway” refers to the decades-long mass migration of Appalachians who have left their ancestral homes seeking greater economic opportunity in urban areas. I hit that highway too, when I was 18 years old. I […]
Posted inRural Voters
Commentary: Better Ways to Ensure Free and Fair Elections
No matter what happens next in these turbulent times, there are people in our rural communities who do not believe the United States had a free and fair presidential election in 2020. There are others who have their doubts. Those who have faith in the process and its results also have concerns about what might […]
Posted inCoronavirus
Record Levels of Infections and Deaths Return to Rural Counties
Explore the full-page version of the map Rural America experienced record numbers of Covid-19 infections and deaths last week, showing that a slight respite over the holidays was the result of interruptions in test reporting, not waning strength in the pandemic. Rural counties reported 232,239 new Covid-19 infections last week. That’s a 35% increase from […]
Posted inRural Voters
Analysis: Georgia’s Political Earthquake Was a Long Time in the Making
This article is republished with the permission from “Trouble in God’s Country.” If football is a game of inches, politics is one of fractions — a glacial shift in demographics, incremental growth in voter registration, tiny changes in voter turnout. In isolation, individual events like these may seem small and insignificant. In combination, they are […]
Posted inArts and Culture
Book Review: Grounded by Jon Tester
Democratic Senator Jon Tester of Montana got little fanfare from the press when he published his memoir, Grounded, in September 2020. Only the Wall Street Journal reviewed the book, while National Public Radio and the Los Angeles Review of Books interviewed the Senator. The New York Times finally talked to Tester, too, but only in […]
Posted inMedia
Commentary: Rural Journalists and the Insurrection
This column was originally published in the Rural Blog of the Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues. The insurrection at the U.S. Capitol last week was driven by a mistaken belief, generated by President Trump and his allies, that the election was stolen from him. Millions of the president’s supporters believe this lie, so it is damaging […]
