The Southern Documentary Project
TEACHING THE NEXT GENERATION OF STORYTELLERS
We had a wonderful screening of the Toughest Job: William Winter’s Mississippi in Jackson last Thursday night to kickoff the broadcast premiere on Mississippi Public Broadcasting. Kudos to MPB for creating beautiful banners to match the poster graphics for the film. There’s an additional broadcast tonight on MPB at 8pm and a free screening in Oxford at the Overby Center on campus at 6pm. Be sure to check out our newly designed website, toughestjobmovie.com for more details.
– Matthew
This week, we had all hands on deck shooting a “State of the University” video with Chancellor Jones around campus. Special thanks to everyone involved who worked so hard for the last few days including Andy Harper, Karen Tuttle, Joe York, Rex Jones, Mary Stanton, Todd Lauterbach and Matt Minshew.
– Matthew
Congrats to Tyler Keith, Eric Griffis, and Meghan Leonard–Southern Studies grad. students whose film on the Brown Family Dairy was featured in the New York Times today with a wonderful article on the Brown family. This film came out of the Documentary Fieldwork class that we taught last spring with David Wharton at the Center for the Study of Southern Culture.
Here are the final projects from the Southern Studies Documentary Fieldwork class we taught this semester with David Wharton. We are proud of the graduate students and the hard work that went into producing these documentaries.
“Biker’s Preacher”, by Novelette Brown, Jake Fussell, and Amanda Lillard
“A Grit Flick,” by J. Bingo Gunter
“Brown Family Dairy,” by Tyler Keith, Eric Griffis, and Meghan Leonard
“Original Grit Girl,” by Catherine Stout
MDP was at the Overby Center tonight recording Professor Gary Gallagher’s lecture on the Civil War in Hollywood. The presentation, sponsored by the UM Center for Civil War Research, addressed the main interpretations of the Civil War as depicted in motion pictures.
MDP was at the Overby Center tonight for “Ole Miss and the People of the World: A Symposium on Reconciliation.” The panel, sponored by the William Winter Institute for Racial Reconciliation, and moderated by Chanellor Dan Jones, looked at ways we can work toward reconciliation with nations we have historically had strained relations with.
This week the Media and Documentary Projects Center traveled to McComb and Tupelo to address the Mississippi Arts Commission festival and event coordinator’s workshops (co-sponsored by the Mississippi Development Authority). 
Andy, Matthew, and Micah hit the road and we used this blog entry to show how easy it is to create content on the fly for websites with the WordPress application for iPhone. Thanks to Southern Studies graduate and MAC Heritage Director Mary Margaret Miller for the invitation.
Dr. Samir Husni was in the audio booth today for an interview with NPR’s Jim Zarroli. Professor Husni, who is better known in the publishing world as Mr. Magazine discussed the future of magazines with a specific emphasis on new releases.
Click below to hear Mr. Magazine’s thoughts on the current advertising cycle.
“Lunches and Learning”
“Landmines and Levees”
Here are the 2009 University of Mississippi Institutional Spots that we have produced over the course of the semester for University Brand Services.
The Media and Documentary Projects Center worked with Jamil Northcutt in the Athletics Dept. to produce this video as a means of encouraging fans at the games to recycle. The spot was produced to be played at home games between the 3rd and 4th quarter, with a dual purpose: Remind everyone to recycle and to get ready for the “crunchtime” of the 4th quarter.
Produced by Jamil Northcutt, Matthew Graves, Andy Harper, and Micah Ginn.
In addition to our own documentary work and working with student filmmakers, the Media and Documentary Projects Center helps produce and record campus events. October has been an especially busy month (and we haven’t even gotten to the Southern Foodways Alliance Symposium yet!).
Above: Matthew Graves tests out the system in advance of the M-Club Hall of Fame Ceremony and Andy Harper shoots the SFA Viking Range lecture featuring Warren Belasco. Below: Micah Ginn sets up the switcher for the Alumni Hall of Fame, and Karen Tuttle helps shoot the Overby Center event honoring member of the 1959 National Championship football team.
The Media and Documentary Projects Center presents The Debate Starts Here: The Presidential Debate Comes to Ole Miss. A look into one of the pivotal moments in Ole Miss history when the eyes of the nation and entire world looked to the University of Mississippi as we hosted the first Presidential debate of 2008. With interviews from University officials, Oxford residents, national journalists, and politicians, we cover the exciting events leading up to the debate and explore the tremendous effort involved behind the scenes to bring a Presidential debate to life. The Debate Starts Here will premiere Friday, September 25th at 4pm at the Overby Center Auditorium, marking the one year anniversary of this historic debate.
MDP intern Alyssa Manhold interviewed Ole Miss starting center Daverin Geralds this week for a segment that will run later on the ESPNU Campus Connection. Alyssa spoke with Daverin, an SEC Academic Honor Roll honoree, about the challenges of maintaining high academic standards while playing for a top 10 football team.
ESPNU’s Campus Connection is part of the agreement between the SEC and ESPN to create academic opportunities at each SEC member institution. The UM Media and Documentary Projects Center is producing content for the SEC Academic Network and will work with students on campus to provide content for Campus Connection and for the SEC Week program on ESPNU.
The Media and Documentary Projects team hit the field today with Coach Houston Nutt to shoot “Crunch Time.” This spot, featuring the partnership between Coke, the University of Mississippi Athletics Department, MDP, and the campus Green Initiative will play on the giant screen at the beginning of the 4th quarter in an effort to fire the crowd up for the last quarter and promote recycling inside the stadium. When you see coach Nutt on the big screen, pick up an empty plastic bottle, crunch it loudly, then find one of the new recycle bins on your way out of the stadium.
Tom Rankin, Director of the Duke University Center for Documentary Studies (and long time Oxford friend) was in the audio booth today for an interview with WUNC’s “The State of Things.” Tom was speaking about the new CDS project Five Farms: Stories from American Farm Families. We are pleased to be able to collaborate with WUNC and to have Tom (whose program is one of the examples that we try to emulate here) in the studio.
Southern Studies Graduate Intern Melanie Young got some experience behind the console today as the session engineer.
Media Production was there in force to cover the listening session for the newly announced Chancellor, Dr. Dan Jones. Pictured is Greg Grey, our ringer from Memphis, Andy Harper and Karen Tuttle who were streaming the all day Q&A sessions over the web. Not pictured are Micah Ginn and Matthew Graves who were there documenting the event and providing a news package for use over satellite (or “the bird” as the insiders call it). Congratulations to Chancellor Jones for his accomplishment and we at the Media and Documentary Projects Center look forward to working with him.
We were able to grab an interview with Bob Schieffer of “Face the Nation” for CBS News for our upcoming documentary about the Presidential Debate. Mr. Schieffer is in Oxford for tomorrow’s graduation ceremony where he’ll be giving the commencement address which, incidentally, we’ll be shooting as well. It was a great interview and a welcomed addition to what’s shaping up to be a well-rounded project.
Watch this great clip we shot tonight of country singer Marty Stuart singing “The Moss Point Kid” to Chancellor Khayat. Stuart wrote the song especially for Chancellor Khayat as a part of the night’s concert and celebration honoring the Chancellor and raising funds for Thacker Mountain Radio. It was a great moment and a nice and touching way of saying thank you to the Chancellor for his years of service to the University.
We had the chance to interview Tom Brokaw tonight for our upcoming documentary about the Presidential Debate. Mr. Brokaw was visiting Oxford to take part in a panel discussion at the Overby Center and was able to stop by and give us a great interview that will be a helpful addition to this ongoing project.
Andy Harper and Matthew Graves were in the Grove this morning getting footage of the festivities planned for local school kids to celebrate Earth Day. This is another in a series of events for Green Week at the University. Check back later for more updates including a post from this afternoon’s World Day Celebration.
Andy Harper and Matthew Graves were in the Johnson’s Commons Ballroom today filming Toyota General Manager Kevin Butt. The keynote address was sponsored by the Center for Manufacturing Excellence in conjunction with Green Week.
Here are some pics from last night’s Chucky Mullins Courage Award Ceremony where Defensive End Marcus Tillman came home with prestigious award. This was the 20th anniversary of the event which began as a way to honor Ole Miss defensive back Chucky Mullins. Our own Micah Ginn produced the event creating video tributes to Mullins and highlight reels for the night’s finalists. It was a large effort but the night was a great success. Noah Bunn, Hunter Palmer, Andy Harper, and Matthew Graves were on hand to help the night run smoothly. For more information on Chucky check out the website for Micah’s documentary film “Undefeated – The Chucky Mullins Story”.
Here’s a still from the video we shot last night in the Ford Center of Handel’s Messiah, performed by the University of Mississippi Concert Singers with Orchestra. Pictured is guest conductor Dr. Dennis Shrock.
Here are a few pics from today’s shoot with recent Ole Miss grad and Rhodes Scholar recipient Shad White. Shad is participating in a video we’re producing for the Ole Miss Momentum Campaign as well as a new “Are You Ready?” spot featuring the Honors College. Be sure to check out our other “Are You Ready?” spots here and let us know if you think of other people or programs on campus that should be highlighted.
This past weekend, the University of Mississippi hosted some 1,500 student orientation leaders for the Southern Regional Orientation Workshop (SROW). Micah Ginn and Andy Harper were there to record their Song, Skit, and Dance competition at the Tad Pad. It was a lively bunch and they showed tremendous spirit and sportsmanship (first time we’d seen other SEC schools doing the gator chomp in support of Florida!).
This semester Joe York and Andy Harper are helping teach SST 554, Documentary Fieldwork, with Dr. David Wharton. The class has been divided into five groups and each group will produce a ten minute short documentary focusing on the intersection between local food and culture. In this short video student George Ray discusses the project he and students Ben Guest and Katrina Hayes will be producing.
