Chandra Owenby Hopkins: A Celebration of Southern Stages

Join us for a celebration of Chandra Owenby Hopkins's new book "Southern Stages: Space and Memory in U.S. Performance." This is a free event. If you would like to purchase "Southern Stages," please be aware that copies of the book will only be available by pre-ordering them via Eventbrite.

About the Book 

Through the eyes of actors and everyday people, /Southern Stages /offers an engaging new model for interrogating the performance of southernness, as well as how memory and imagination intersect in spaces that have shaped hundreds of years of American history. Chandra Owenby Hopkins employs cultural memory and lived realities of Black and white communities to examine the earliest and most enduring southern stages: the playhouse and the public square. Each day, countless southerners pass symbols and monuments dedicated to white supremacy and the “Old South”: statues, cemeteries, plantations, downtown squares, and even regional theatre stages. Some may only glance at them, ignorant to their history, while others recall the physical and psychological trauma embedded by generations of enslavement. Through the eyes of actors and everyday people, /Southern Stages/ offers an engaging new model for interrogating the performance of southernness, as well as how memory and imagination intersect in spaces that have shaped hundreds of years of American history. Chandra Owenby Hopkins employs cultural memory and lived realities of Black and white communities to examine the earliest and most enduring southern stages: the playhouse and the public square. 

About the Author 

Chandra Owenby Hopkins is associate professor of theatre and dean of the Converse College for Women at Converse University. Her work has appeared in "Theatre Journal," "Theatre History Studies," and "Theatre Survey." Hopkins lives in Spartanburg, South Carolina.