UNL Center for Great Plains Studies

Great Plains Graduate Fellow Jim Benes is featured in this story on Nebraska Today!

Onetime UCARE student Benes now mentors two students in research | Nebraska Today As a first-generation college student, Jim Benes' interest in research was sparked by his participation in the Undergraduate Creative Activities and Research Experiences Program. Now, two UCARE students — Jasmine Pham and Joe Stalder — are gaining hands-on experience in his lab.

Thursday!

Event 2024-08-30 00:00:01.0 Margaret Jacobs, Christina Goodsen, and Cory DeRoin Present: "Walking in the Footsteps of our Ancestors: Re-Indigenizing Southeast Nebraska" - Gage County Historical Society and Museum Gage County Historical Society and Museum.

Submissions are open! Send us your creative nonfiction pieces about the Great Plains. Details at: https://plains.unl.edu/publications/great-plains-quarterly/

Here's your chance to become a part of a Great Plains Art Museum exhibition! Write a postcard to the Great Plains and it will become part of an installation created by our student storyteller Karla Hernandez Torrijos opening this fall.
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdexxgYttrFmYoFI3rHr_67oLZ1s-_RaWHirmKY6qLbfpJCiQ/viewform?usp=sf_link

Free article this week in Great Plains Quarterly: "Prairie Grass and Mesquite: Memoir, Memory, and Coming Out in the Great Plains"
Christopher J. Hommerding reviews Taylor Brorby's "Boys and Oil: Growing Up Gay in a Fractured Land" and Cade Mason's "Engine Running: Essays" to discuss different aspects of coming out as LGBTQ in the Great Plains.
https://muse.jhu.edu/pub/17/article/927246

This summer, we’re featuring collection highlights selected and researched by Collections Intern Payton Fallick. Payton’s descriptions invite you to connect with these works, contemplate their compositions and meanings, and learn a little bit more about the collection!
This watercolor painting by Karen Dienstbier transports viewers into the heart of the autumnal prairie landscape with striking beauty and vivid detail. Through a harmonious blend of warm and earthy tones and vibrant splashes of autumn hues, Dienstbier captures the essence of the season’s transformation. The vast expanse of the prairie is depicted with a sense of awe and reverence amidst the flowing colors and shapes of the prairie grasses in the wind.

Artwork:
Karen Dienstbier
"Prairie Grasses Series, Fall"
1985
watercolor on paper
Gift of Richard A. Dienstbier

Free article in Great Plains Quarterly this week: "Losing Ty." In this touching tribute to her brother, Ty, Lorna Milne shares the hard reality of pesticide-related cancers so prevalent in their eastern Montana town and raises awareness to the dangers of widespread pesticide use. https://muse.jhu.edu/pub/17/article/927245

Free article in Great Plains Quarterly this week: In "A Genuine Granger Song: Reverend Knowles Shaw and 'The Farmer Is the Man,'" Thomas D. Isern shows how such folk songs became popular in the late nineteenth century in response to growing urbanization.
https://muse.jhu.edu/pub/17/article/927244

Free article in Great Plains Quarterly this week: "Black Homesteading in Southern New Mexico: An Undertold Story"
Richard V. Adkisson explores the challenges, tragedies, and triumphs of Black homesteaders near Las Cruces, New Mexico, from the late 1920s through the 1930s.
https://muse.jhu.edu/pub/17/article/927243

Free article this week in Great Plains Quarterly: Based on extensive archival research, Brent M.S. Campney examines Jim Crow practices and the Black Freedom Struggle in Kansas between 1945 and 1960 in "Stamping Out Segregation in Kansas."
https://muse.jhu.edu/pub/17/article/927242

Tomorrow!

The Great Plains Art Museum is open late on June 7 for First Friday, 5-7 pm with three new exhibitions.
Admission is always free! https://events.unl.edu/plains/2024/06/07/181593/

Keep updated on the project's work via newsletter or text messages! Sign up for either (or both!) here: https://mailchi.mp/unl/ylo4cpfb62

Today is Give to Lincoln Day! All day long the Lincoln community is supporting the organizations that enrich our city. We hope you'll consider supporting the Center for Great Plains Studies and the Great Plains Art Museum today. Donations today will make a bigger impact because nonprofits also receive a proportional share of a $650K match fund provided by the Lincoln Community Foundation and sponsors. 🎉
https://givetolincoln.com/nonprofits/great-plains-art-museum

Giving is open now!

The Great Plains Art Museum creates ongoing opportunities for the community to engage with and learn from artists working in the region. We'd love your support during Give to Lincoln Day so we can keep bringing Great Plains artists to Lincoln!
Give now at: https://givetolincoln.com/nonprofits/great-plains-art-museum
Photo: Linda Rivera García leads a papel picado workshop

Have you enjoyed an art exhibition, talk, or the annual conference? Consider supporting our mission to cultivate awareness of and engagement with the diverse people, cultures, and natural environments of the Great Plains during Give to Lincoln Day! Donate now at: https://givetolincoln.com/nonprofits/great-plains-art-museum

Your donation to the Center for Great Plains Studies and Great Plains Art Museum during Give to Lincoln Day supports a unique institution that cultivates awareness of and engagement with the diverse people, cultures, and natural environments of the Great Plains.
Give now at: https://givetolincoln.com/nonprofits/great-plains-art-museum

We're looking for our next Great Plains Student Storyteller in Residence! Over the course of the academic year, the storyteller will produce a visual and/or written project that helps tell the story of the region by working with Center mentors. The student will receive a one-time stipend of $1,275, an office at the Center for the academic year, mentorship, and help publishing their project. Project examples include: a podcast, essays, poetry, website, film, visual artwork, film, etc.
Apply by May 15. Details: https://www.unl.edu/plains/student-storyteller-residence

A new issue of Great Plains Quarterly has arrived!
Articles include:
✒️"Black Homesteading in Southern New Mexico: An Undertold Story"
✒️"Prairie Grass and Mesquite: Memoir, Memory, and Coming Out in the Great Plains"
✒️"'Stamping Out Segregation in Kansas': Jim Crow Practices and the Postwar Black Freedom Struggle"
https://muse.jhu.edu/issue/52528

We're happy to announce the artists selected for Contemporary Indigeneity 2024. For the fifth iteration of this exhibition, the Great Plains Art Museum sought Native American artists addressing any issues and themes relevant to the contemporary Indigenous experience on the Great Plains. A panel of Native American art professionals reviewed the submitted work and made selections based on the artwork’s aesthetic merit and contribution to the field of contemporary art. The exhibition opens Sept. 6.
2024 Artists:
Savannah Berlyn Anderson
Angela Babby
Marwin Begaye
Rachel Berg
Awanigiizhik Bruce
Mona Cliff
Gordon C***s
Dennis Fox
Dustina Gill
Kimberly Hager
Hotvlkuce Harjo
Jessica Moore Harjo
Sun Rose Iron Shell
Kelsey Jacobson
Valentina LaPier
Steve C. LaRance
Chris Pappan
Henry Payer
Daniel Pewewardy
Meredith Radke-Gannon
Nathaniel Ruleaux
Nelda Schrupp
Tony A. Tiger
Crystal Wabnum
Benjamin West
Paula Whatley
https://www.unl.edu/plains/contemporary-indigeneity

The winner of the 2024 Stubbendieck Great Plains Distinguished Book Prize is "Birding While Indian: A Mixed-Blood Memoir" (The Ohio State University Press, 2023) by Thomas C. Gannon.

The Center for Great Plains Studies’ Book Prize, in its 18th year, celebrates the most outstanding work about the Great Plains during the past year, chosen by an independent group of scholars.

Gannon is an Associate Professor of English and Ethnic Studies at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and the Associate Director of Ethnic Studies. This marks the first time the book prize has been awarded to a UNL faculty member and current Great Plains Fellow.
https://www.unl.edu/plains/bookprize/bookprize.shtml

Do you have a story to tell about the Great Plains? The Center for Great Plains Studies invites any UNL undergraduate or graduate student to apply for its annual Student Storyteller in Residence program. The successful applicant will be provided a one-time stipend, an office at the Center for the 2024-25 year, and mentorship. Apply by May 15.
https://www.unl.edu/plains/student-storyteller-residence

Thanks to all our keynotes, panelists, and guests at the 2024 Great Plains conference! And huge thanks to our program committee for helping us find this great line up of speakers: Gwendŵr Meredith, Todd Richardson, Alana Stone, Will Stoutamire, Sandra Williams, Margaret Jacobs, Alison Cloet, and Katie Nieland

Nice story from the student newspaper on our Student Storyteller in Residence:

Hernandez Torrijos helps Nebraska rethink relationship with Great Plains Hernandez Torrijos, a junior UNL student, wants to create an installation at the Great Plains Art Museum of postcards, written on by people expressing their own experience of the Great Plains.

This week!

Artist in Residence week starts today! During her residency, Angela Two Stars will create an artwork that will become part of the museum’s collection. Visitors are encouraged to see the artist in action in the lower-level studio April 9-13, 10a-5pm. https://events.unl.edu/plains/2024/04/09/180007/

Tonight!

Today is First Friday at the Great Plains Art Museum and we're open late, 5-7pm. Stop by the lower level education studio to take part in a community storytelling postcard project that will be installed at the museum later this year. Details: https://events.unl.edu/plains/2024/04/05/180141/

Congrats to the finalists for the 2024 Stubbendieck Great Plains Distinguished Book Prize!
📖THE COST OF FREE LAND (Penguin Random House) by Rebecca Clarren
📖BIRDING WHILE INDIAN (The Ohio State University Press) by Dr. Tom Gannon
📖AMERICAN BURIAL GROUND (University of Pennsylvania Press by Dr. Sarah Keyes
Each year the Center for Great Plains Studies presents a prize for the previous year's best book on the Great Plains. The Stubbendieck Great Plains Distinguished Book Prize carries a cash award of $10,000, generously supported by Jim and Cheryl Stubbendieck.

More about the finalists: https://www.unl.edu/plains/bookprize/bookprize.shtml