Louisiana is one step closer to naming its next poet laureate. A special statewide panel, chaired by Michael Sartisky, PhD, president and executive director of the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities, has sent the names of three finalists to Governor Bobby Jindal who by statute will make the final selection subject to confirmation by the Louisiana senate. The finalists include:

• Ava Leavell Haymon, a nationally recognized poet and teacher who organizes poetry workshops and seminars throughout the state, including the Artists-in-the-Schools program in Baton Rouge, the Junior Great Books program in several parishes, and numerous classes at LSU.  Her three full-length collections, The Strict Economy of Fire, Kitchen Heat, and most recently, Why the House is Made of Gingerbread, were published by LSU Press. In 2010, the Academy of American Poets featured one of her poems as "the poem of the day." 
• Jack Bedell, PhD, a professor of the humanities at Southeastern Louisiana University in Hammond and the author of seven books, including Call and Response (with Darrell Bourque, 2010), Come Rain, Come Shine (2006), and What Passes for Love (2001). His journal, Louisiana Literature, has published numerous Louisiana poets. Bedell has taught creative writing to students from the third-grade level to the graduate level. His work reflects a familiarity with daily life in the state and its people.
• Julie Kane, PhD, a professor of English at Northwestern State University in Natchitoches.  A tireless promoter of poetry in the state, she is a recipient of the National Poetry Series Award (2002), the Donald Justice Poetry Prize (2009), and a Fulbright Scholarship (2002). In 2005, she was selected as a juror for the National Book Award in Poetry. Kane is also an astute editor and the publisher of the award-winning book, Counterpart: A South Vietnamese Naval Officer's War, as well as Umpteen Ways of Looking at a Possum: Critical and Creative Responses to Everette Maddox, and Voices of the American South.   Her other collections, Jazz Funeral and Rhythm & Booze celebrate the culture of New Orleans

According to selection guidelines, nominees must have published works in books, anthologies, literary journals or magazines. In addition, the selection committee must seek information from the general public and the literary community. The committee must select nominees who reflect the diverse cultures and heritage of Louisiana.

Once the nominee is approved by the governor, the new poet laureate will replace poet Darrell Bourque, PhD, a professor emeritus of English at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette and St. Landry Parish resident, who has served in that position since 2008. His term ends May 20, 2011. Bourque succeeded Brenda Marie Osbey, who served as the State Poet Laureate from 2005 to 2007. Osbey was Louisiana's first peer-selected poet laureate.

Under state law, the LEH is charged with overseeing the poet laureate nomination process. It selects a nominations committee consisting of two published poets from Louisiana, two professors of literature from a Louisiana college or university, two representatives from the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities, and a representative from Louisiana State University Press. Nominees must be either born or domiciled in Louisiana at the time of nomination.

This year's panel included LEH President and Executive Director Michael Sartisky; Prof. John Biguenet, Loyola University and LEH Board Member; Peter Cooley, PhD, Tulane University; David Middleton, PhD, Nichols State University; Reggie Young, PhD, University of Louisiana at Lafayette; Prof. Jack Heflin, University of Louisiana at Monroe; Brian Boyles, Director, Louisiana Humanities Center; and MaryKatherine Callaway, Director, LSU Press.

The LEH will provide grants to non-profit organizations in Louisiana, such as libraries, adult literacy groups, and groups interested in language studies, that wish to host Bourque for poetry readings, discussion or presentations. For additional information, contact Michael Sartisky at 504-620-2480 or sartisky@leh.org.

Michael Sartisky, PhD and Barry Ancelet, PhD

On Dec. 14, LEH President and Executive Director Michael Sartisky attended annual awards ceremonies at the Center for Louisiana Studies at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette where he received for the LEH the 2010 James William Rivers Prize for Louisiana Studies. The Center presented the award to the LEH for its "longtime contributions to a vast array of fields related to Louisiana studies through its programming initiatives and financial support." The committee cited the following programs administered by the LEH as factors in its decision:

• Grant Programs

• Louisiana Publishing Initiative Grants

                          • Teacher Institutes for Advance Study Grants

• Documentary Film and Radio Grants

• Public Humanities Grants

• Outreach and Planning Grants

• RELIC (Readings in Literature and Culture) Program

• Teaching American History Institutes

• Louisiana Cultural Vistas Magazine

• "KnowLA" Online Encyclopedia

• Annual Louisiana Humanities Awards

The James William Rivers Prize in Louisiana Studies was established to honor persons who have contributed or rendered, recently or over the course of their careers, outstanding scholarly

study, work, or teaching about the culture, history, art, architecture, crafts, flora, fauna, music, literature, law, performing arts, or geography of Louisiana or about its people. The Rivers Prize was established with private funds donated in memory of Mr. Rivers, a New Orleans architect and graduate of USL (now the University of Louisiana at Lafayette), who died in 1991.

Past recipients of the James Williams Rivers Prize:

A. Hays Town (1992), Marcel Giraud (1993), Saul Litvinoff (1994), Joy J. Jackson (1995), Barry J. Ancelet (1996), Mary Louise Christovich (1997), Ernest J. Gaines (1998), Samuel Wilson, Jr. (1999), Glen Jeansonne (2000), Elemore Morgan, Sr.& Elemore Morgan, Jr. (2001), Mathé Allain (2002), Glenn R. Conrad (2003), Louisiana Public Broadcasting (2004), Ellis Marsalis (2005), Frank de Caro (2006), James Lee Burke (2007), Jay D. Edwards & the Fred B. Kniffen Cultural Resources Laboratory (2008), and Carl A. Brasseaux (2009).

www.knowla.org

The Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities, or LEH, has launched KnowLA, its online encyclopedia of Louisiana history and culture. The only resource of its kind, KnowLA makes accurate, engaging, scholarly information about Louisiana's culture and history available to everyone. By compiling peer reviewed, in-depth entries, written by the top scholars in their fields, KnowLA staff is building a permanent digital archive of scholarship on Louisiana available to anyone, anytime, with special features for students, teachers and cultural travelers. KnowLA also brings together resources from most of the state's major archives and special collections. To visit KnowLA, click here www.knowla.org

Like Louisiana itself, KnowLA is a work in progress. The version of KnowLA that you now see was launched in January 2010 and presents a BETA, or trial, version of the site.  Currently, KnowLA includes more than three hundred entries in six subject areas - architecture, art, folklife, history, literature, and music - as well as hundreds of images. A number of the entries are still under development and are labeled accordingly.  Most entries, however, are already accompanied by images, a bibliography of suggested readings, a list of related KnowLA entries, and links to useful resources off the site.

Throughout 2011, the LEH will finalize entries already online and adding others in these subject areas. Its staff will continue to develop KnowLA over the next seven years, adding two to three hundred new entries each year, as well as additional features. In addition to the original six subject areas, the LEH will include archaeology; business and industry; education; ethnicity; foodways; geography and the environment; government/politics; languages; law; media; religion; science and medicine; sports and recreation; travel and tourism.

On Dec. 4, the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences awarded All Over but to Cry with an Emmy at the 34th annual Suncoast Emmy awards gala in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida. The National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences recognizes excellence in television with its annual Emmy award competition.

All Over but to Cry, underwritten in part by a LEH documentary film grant, is a very intimate and stunning account of the day in 1957 when Hurricane Audrey smashed into the Cajun communities of southwest Louisiana, bringing a massive tidal wave and leaving more than 500 people dead. Survivors describe clinging to trees and rooftops, floating on a refrigerator through the Gulf, and watching loved ones drown.

Jennifer John Block and Jake Springfield spent two years producing the film, which was completed in May 2009. The documentary started as an oral history project for the Lake Charles-based National Hurricane Museum and Science Center. Block and Springfield recently signed a deal with EBS World Entertainment to distribute the film to international television markets. The team is working with Circus Road Films on North American distribution.

All Over but to Cry also won 2010 Humanities Documentary Film of the Year from the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities as well as Best Documentary Feature at the 2010 Cinema on the Bayou Film Festival in Lafayette, La. The film was an Official Selection at the 2009 Atlantic Film Festival in Nova Scotia.

Times-Picayune movie critic Mike Scott praised All Over but to Cry, calling it "powerful, gripping stuff, a story worthy of Hollywood-and can't miss cinema for local residents." Scott ranked the film among the "10 Great Docs from 2009," which included national and international documentary films, as well as among "Top 10 New Orleans Films."

All Over but to Cry was produced by Fresh Media, a New Orleans-based production company (www.getfreshmedia.com), in association with the National Hurricane Museum and Science Center (www.nhmsc.com), a derivative of the Creole Nature Trail All-American Road.

Jennifer John Block also produced Reconstructing Creole (2007), which won Best Documentary Feature at the Hollywood DV Film Festival and Humanities Documentary of the Year from the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities in 2008. Block is President of Fresh Media. She is also an adjunct professor at Tulane and Loyola universities.

Wendy Rodrigue

Wendy Wolfe Rodrigue, wife of Louisiana artist George Rodrigue, is the newest member of the LEH Board of Directors. Wendy grew up in Fort Walton Beach, Florida, but embraces her New Orleans roots, home to her family since the 1940s. She graduated from Trinity University in San Antonio with degrees in art history and English, followed by graduate studies at Tulane University in New Orleans and one year at American University in Vienna, Austria.

In 1990 she joined the staff of the Rodrigue Gallery on Royal Street in the New Orleans French Quarter, and in 1991, she moved to Carmel, California, where she ran George Rodrigue's gallery for six years before returning to New Orleans. Today, she is the main archivist for Rodrigue's work and is actively involved in Rodrigue Gallery operations and the George Rodrigue Foundation of the Arts.

Wendy lectures extensively on Rodrigue's art. She is also a contributing writer and editor on his books, most recently compiling his catalogue raisonne Prints for the fine arts publisher Harry N. Abrams (published March 2008). She has curated numerous Rodrigue exhibitions, most notably the 2007 Rodrigue retrospective at the Dixon Gallery and Gardens Museum in Memphis and the 2008 Rodrigue exhibition at the New Orleans Museum of Art.

Currently she writes two blogs: "Musings of an Artist's Wife," focusing on the artwork and life of George Rodrigue; and "Dolores Pepper," a cultural column for Gambit, the New Orleans weekly paper. She is a member of the Board of Trustees of the New Orleans Museum of Art. George and Wendy were married in 1997. They divide their time between their homes in New Orleans's Faubourg Marigny and Carmel Valley, California.

The LEH received a $120,000 grant from the Google Corporation to facilitate the LEH's outreach, "branding," and overall constituency building efforts. The in-kind donation of "Google AdWords" will promote the LEH's magazine, website, programs and mission on a global basis.  Several LEH programs will create dedicated advertisements, allowing Google search users to connect with and support these programs. "This donation is much appreciated because of its excellent timing," stated Dr. Michael Sartisky, LEH president and executive director.  "With KnowLA, the online encyclopedia of Louisiana history and culture, debuting last December, and the LEH facing a possible third consecutive year of state appropriation cuts, we are aggressively seeking to expand the LEH's visibility and connectivity with local, statewide, national and even international audiences."

The LEH is pleased to announce a new $50,000 philanthropic partnership with the New Orleans-based Entergy Charitable Foundation. The donation will underwrite an expansion of the LEH's award-winning PRIME TIME Family Reading Time program across the Greater New Orleans area throughout 2011 and 2012. A total of ten Entergy-funded PRIME TIME programs will make possible the program's expansion to serve approximately 400 6 to10 year-old students who are at risk for low literacy.

"This donation comes at a pivotal time in the evolution of education and family literacy in Greater New Orleans," said Miranda Restovic, director of the PRIME TIME program. "While the ongoing educational reform movement is certainly making positive strides, the lingering problem of intergenerational illiteracy and low literacy remains a systemic inhibitor of basic educational progress. We are extremely grateful to Jennifer Quezergue, Patty Riddlebarger, and everyone at the Entergy Charitable Foundation for assisting with PRIME TIME's program expansion in one of the highest need regions of our state."

The Carolyn W. and Charles T. Beaird Family Foundation of Shreveport recently committed $15,000 to support PRIME TIME Family Reading Time in Greater Shreveport in 2011. "We have supported many literacy efforts in the past, and are happy to be making PRIME TIME available again in Shreveport," stated Susan Beaird, the foundation's President. Thanks also to Jim Montgomery, Executive Director, for his encouragement and support of the LEH over the years.

 For the 4th consecutive year, the Mandeville, La.-based GPOA Foundation has elected to support the LEH's PRIME TIME Family Reading Time program. Via a highly-competitive application process, the foundation awarded LEH $7,500 to support PRIME TIME programming across Greater New Orleans in 2011. "GPOA support is pivotal because it allows us to supplement and enhance PRIME TIME programming across one of the highest need regions of our state," said Miranda Restovic, PRIME TIME program director. "We are deeply grateful to Lisa M. Kaichen, Foundation Manager, for her consistent support of family literacy across Greater New Orleans."

Mark this date! The LEH's 2011 awards ceremony will be held at 12:30 p.m. April 2 at Houmas House Plantation and Gardens on River Road in Darrow, La., just south of Baton Rouge. For ticket information about the awards ceremony, contact Brian Boyles at the LEH, 504-620-2622 or boyles@leh.org.

Each year, the LEH honors Louisianians who have made outstanding contributions to the study and understanding of the humanities. In addition to Humanist of the Year, awards are given for Lifetime Contribution to the Humanities, Chair's Award for Institutional Support, Humanities Documentary Film of the Year, Individual Achievement in the Humanities, Public Humanities Programming, Humanities Book of the Year, the Humanities Teacher of the Year, and the Michael P. Smith Memorial Award for Documentary Photography. Award Recipients will be announced later this month.

Writers and documentary photographers, exploring Louisiana-related cultural topics, may be eligible to receive special grants up to $4,000 through the LEH's annual Louisiana Publishing Initiative grants program.

Grants are available for authors writing about non-fiction topics such as literature, history, languages, music, cultural anthropology, folk life or other humanities disciplines. Grants of $4,000 also are available for documentary photographers to document various aspects of Louisiana's diverse culture. All awards must culminate in a completed non-fiction, book-length manuscript. Novels, poetry and other forms of fiction are not eligible. The application deadline is Feb. 15.

Past recipients include Dictionary of Louisiana French: As Spoken in Cajun, Creole and American Indian Communities; Bliss Broyard's One Drop; Philip Gould's Louisiana's Capitol; Gwendolyn Midlo Hall's Africans in Colonial Louisiana; Elizabeth Mullener's Eyewitness: Tales of New Orleanians in World War II; and Plantations by the River by Jay Edwards.

For additional information, contact John R. Kemp at the LEH, 504-620-2481, kemp@leh.org, or visit Louisiana Publishing Initiative listed under Grants at www.leh.org.

Baton Rouge, Lake Charles and Lafayette - Over the course of more than 160 live events and dozens of live radio and Internet broadcasts, the Louisiana Crossroads series has provided a top-notch showcase for regional and visiting artists in an intimate and accessible format. In January, Crossroads presents 100 years of Robert Johnson with Scott Ainslie, Sam Broussard and David Egan. These performances will retrace the giant steps of Johnson's life in celebration of the centennial of his birth and the 75th anniversary of his epochal recording of "Crossroad Blues."

• Live Broadcast! 7 p.m. Jan. 20, Central School Theater, 326 Pujo St., Lake Charles.
•  8 p.m. Jan. 21, Manship Theatre, 100 Lafayette St., Baton Rouge.
• 8 p.m. Jan. 22, Acadiana Center for the Arts Theater, 101 W. Vermilion St., Lafayette.

For more information call 337-233-7060, or visit acadianacenterforthearts.org/louisiana-crossroads.

Shreveport - The Meadows Museum of Art, located on the campus of Centenary College, 2911 Centenary Boulevard, presents two exhibitions. The first show, Past and Present: Works from the Collection of Carolyn Nelson, runs through Jan. 30. It features art assembled by Shreveport collector Carolyn Nelson, including works by artistic luminaries Edgar Degas, Cecilia Beaux, James McNeil Whistler and Pierre Bonnard. The second exhibition, Past and Present Focus Gallery: Visions and Visionaries, Works by David Holcombe, runs until Feb. 27. The exhibit is comprised of portraits that reflect the social interests of the artist, including elaborate political cartoons that comment on diverse subjects such as gun control, abortion and violence. Tributes to great thinkers, writers, painters and social activists from contemporary Louisiana are also featured. For more information, call 318-869-5040, or visit www.centenary.edu/meadows/calendar.

• Abbeville - Vermilion Parish Library; Abbeville Branch.
• Alexandria - Rapides Library, Main Branch.
• Baton Rouge - Park Forest Elementary School
• Chalmette - St. Bernard Parish School Board; Chalmette Elementary.
• Convent - Romeville Elementary School.
• Houma - Terrebonne Parish Library System; North Terrebonne Branch Library; Terrebonne Parish Library System; North Terrebonne Branch Library.
• Jennings - Jefferson Davis Title I Parent Center; Lake Arthur Elementary.
• Lafayette - Alice Boucher World Languages Academy.
• Lake Charles - Literacy Council of SWLA; Iowa Branch Library; Gillis Elementary School.
• Monroe - Ouachita Parish Public Library.
• New Orleans - ECFLF, Mahalia Jackson Early Childhood Family Learning Center; ECFLF, Mahalia Jackson Early Childhood Family Learning Center; CISNO, Eisenhower Academy for Global Studies; Louisiana Children's Museum; The Porch 7th Ward Cultural Organization; New Orleans Outreach, John Dibert Community School; New Orleans Outreach, Arthur Ashe Charter School; STAIR, Matas Elementary School; CISNO, Success Preparatory Academy; CISNO, Batiste Cultural Academy at Live Oak; CISNO, SciTech Academy at Laurel; ECFLF, Mahalia Jackson Early Childhood Family Learning Center.
• Thibodaux - Lafourche Parish Library; South Lafourche Branch.
• Shreveport - Volunteers of America of North Louisiana.

• Arizona - Mission Branch Library and Valencia Branch Library, Tuscon.
• Florida - North Lauderdale Saraniero Branch Library (Broward County Library System), North Lauderdale; Blake Library (Martin County Library System), Stuart; Crescent City Branch Library (Putnam County Library System), Crescent City.
• Georgia - Chamblee Branch of DeKalb County Library System, Chamblee; Lilburn Branch of Gwinnett County Public Library, Lilburn.
• Louisiana - Louisiana Children's Museum and Mahalia Jackson Early Childhood Family Learning Center, New Orleans; Park Forest Elementary School, Baton Rouge.
• Michigan - Hackley Public Library, Muskegon; Hamtramck Public Library, Hamtramck; Highland Township Public Library, Highland.

On Dec. 4, New Orleans First Lady Cheryl Landrieu and Ruby Bridges hosted the 1st Annual New Orleans Children's Book Festival on the grounds of the historic Latter Branch Library, 5120 St. Charles Ave. The goal of the festival was to bring together children and adults to celebrate literature and the power of reading.

The event provided children and parents with a unique opportunity to interact with exceptional writers and storytellers and to enjoy an inspiring variety of book-related activities, exhibitions, and demonstrations. The LEH hosted a tent and facilitated activities and presentations based on the PRIME TIME methodology of guiding families on strategies for bonding through reading and learning together.

The PRIME TIME Training Workshop will take place Jan. 15-16.  Participants from Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Michigan and Wisconsin will join the PRIME TIME staff and a group of experienced consultants for two days of intense instruction and practice based on the PRIME TIME methodology. The workshop will take place at the Louisiana Humanities Center at Turners' Hall in New Orleans. For information concerning upcoming PRIME TIME training opportunities, contact Shantrell Adams at adams@leh.org.

RELIC - the LEH's community library reading program - will commence its winter and spring programs on Jan. 20 in New Roads in Pointe Coupee Parish, with Louisiana Characters: Biographies of the Bayou State.  It is the first of ten programs scheduled to occur in every major region of the state. All are made possible by a combination of state and local funding.

Other RELIC programs will explore the history and mythology of the American West, Southern folklore, Queen Elizabeth I and the Civil War in Louisiana. Not to be outdone by these sweeping vistas in the humanities, residents of Homer will join in the unending search for their region in "Where Is North Louisiana?" while other north Louisianians search for elusive Creoles in Shreveport. Sound interesting? See the schedule below for contact information.

• Baton Rouge - Goodwood Branch, East Baton Rouge Parish Library, Folktales and Stories of the South and Louisiana, Mondays, 7-9 p.m. March 14-Apr. 18, Tel. 225-231-3746.
• Colfax - Grant Parish Library, Elizabeth I of England and Her Times, 6-8 p.m. Tuesdays, Feb. 8-March 15, Tel. 318-627-9920. 
• Homer - Claiborne Parish Library, Where Is North Louisiana? Tuesdays, 6:30-8:30 p.m. Mar. 15-Apr. 26, Tel. 318-927-3845. 
• Lafayette - South Regional Branch, Lafayette Parish Public Library, Louisiana History: Perspectives on the Pelican State, Tuesdays, 6-8 p.m. Apr. 5-May 17, Tel. 337-981-1028. 
• Lake Charles - Calcasieu Parish Public Library, Folktales and Stories of the South and Louisiana, Thursdays, 6-8 p.m. March 10-April 14, Tel. 337-721-7170. 
• Napoleonville - Assumption Parish Library, Battleground Louisiana: Civil War Events and Experiences, Thursdays, 2-4 p.m. March 3-April 7, Tel. 985-369-7070. 
• New Roads - Pointe Coupee Parish Library, Louisiana Characters: Biographies of the State, Thursdays, 2-4 p.m. Jan. 20-Feb. 24, Tel. 225-638-9841.   
• Shreveport - Broadmoor Branch, Shreve Memorial Library, The Creole Identity in Louisiana Literature and History, Tuesdays, 6-8 p.m. March 8-April 12, Tel. 318-219-1701. 
• Slidell - St. Tammany Parish Library, Elizabeth I of England and Her Times, Wednesdays, 5:30-7:30 p.m. March 16-April 20, Tel. 985-646-6470. 
• Winnsboro - Franklin Parish Library, The American West in Fact and Fiction, Tuesdays, 5:30-7:30 p.m. April 5-May 10, Tel. 318-435-4336. 

Here is your chance to send loved ones, your friends from college, a neighbor or maybe a few business associates one full year of the best Louisiana has to offer through a gift subscription to the award-winning Louisiana Cultural Vistas magazine!

Four times a year over the next twelve months, they will be able to paddle the bayou, walk the French Quarter, and explore the Cane River. They will learn Louisiana's history from Hot Sauce to Hot Jazz and travel our towns from Abbeville to Zwolle. And finally, they will enjoy the work of our finest writers, photo-essayists, and artists all bringing forth the magic that comes from Louisiana's people and places, history and culture. The wonderful gift can be given quite easily for only $20. To purchase your gift subscriptions to Louisiana Cultural Vistas online, please click on www.leh.org for the order form or contact Jan Clifford at clifford@leh.org or call 504-620-2630.