Books published by University Press of Mississippi

Spanning the period from 1990 to 2017, Alison Bechdel: Conversations collects ten interviews that illustrate how Bechdel uses her own life, relationships, and contemporary events to expose the world to what she has referred to as the "fringes of acceptability" - the comics genre as well as queer culture and identity.

Explores how comics and notions of the sacred interweave new modes of seeing and understanding the sacral. Coeditors Assaf Gamzou and Ken Koltun-Fromm reveal the graphic character of sacred narratives, imagining new vistas for both comics and religious texts.

Presents ten essays that explore the point where social justice meets the Justice League. Ranging from comics to video games, Netflix, and cosplay, this volume builds a platform for important voices in comics research, engaging with controversy and community to provide deeper insight and thus inspire change.

Presents interviews that span the length of Neil Gaimain's career, from his first formal interview by the BBC at the age of seven to a new, unpublished interview held in 2017. They cover topics as wide and varied as a young Gaiman's thoughts on managing anger, learning the comics trade from Alan Moore, and being on the clock virtually 24/7.

Explores the death of home cooking, revealing how modern changes transformed cooking at home from an odious chore into a concept imbued with deep meanings associated with home, family, and community. Drawing on a wide array of texts - cookbooks, advertising, and more - Dutch analyses the many manifestations of traditional cooking in America today.

Presents the first, full-length scholarly study of Mira Nair's cinema. Amardeep Singh delves into the complexities of her films from 1981 to 2016, offering critical commentary on all of Nair's major works, including her early documentary projects as well as shorts.

Few books have looked at what the zombie means in fiction. Tim Lanzendoerfer fills this gap by looking at a number of zombie novels, short stories, and comics, and probing what the zombie represents in contemporary literature.

After the death of Joseph Stalin, Soviet-era Russia experienced a flourishing artistic movement due to relaxed censorship and economic growth. In this atmosphere of freedom, Russia's satirical magazine Krokodil became rejuvenated. John Etty explores Soviet graphic satire through Krokodil and its political cartoons.

Originally published in 1966, more than ten years after the Supreme Court ended segregation in public schools, James Meredith describes his intense struggle to attend an all-white university and break down long-held race barriers in one of the most conservative states in America.

Lois Weber was one of early Hollywood's most successful screenwriter-directors. Despite her many successes, Weber was pushed out of the business in the 1930s as a result of Hollywood's institutionalized sexism. This book restores her long-muted voice by reprinting more than sixty items in which she expressed her views on a range of filmic subjects.

In the first volume to collect the paintings and drawings of Clarence Major, readers are offered six decades of unique, colourful, and compelling canvases and works on paper-works of singular beauty and social relevance. These works represent Major's personal painterly journey of passionate commitment to art.

During the civil rights era, Mississippi was caught in the hateful embrace of a white caste system that enforced segregation. Rather than troubling the Closed Society, state news media, on the whole, marched in lockstep or, worse, promoted the continued subservience of blacks. Surprisingly, challenges from Mississippi's college basketball courts questioned segregation's validity and its gentleman's agreement that prevented college teams in the Magnolia State from playing against integrated foes.Mississippi State University stood at the forefront of this battle for equality in the state with the school's successful college basketball program. From 1959 through 1963, the Maroons won four Southeastern Conference basketball championships and created a dynasty in the South's preeminent college athletic conference. However, in all four title-winning seasons, the press feverishly debated the merits of a National Collegiate Athletic Association appearance for the Maroons, culminating in Mississippi State University's participation in the integrated 1963 NCAA Championship.Full Court Press examines news articles, editorials, and columns published in Mississippi's newspapers during the eight-year existence of the gentleman's agreement that barred black participation, the challenges posed by Mississippi State University, and the subsequent integration of college basketball. While the majority of reporters opposed any effort to integrate, a segment of sports journalists, led by the charismatic Jimmie McDowell of the Jackson State Times, emerged as bold advocates for equality. Full Court Presshighlights an ideological metamorphosis within the press during the civil rights movement. The media, which had long minimized the struggle of blacks, slowly transformed into an industry that considered the plight of black Mississippians on equal footing with whites.