|
By Allyson Mann
tiny@uga.edu
John Egerton, a free-lance journalist and author of the award-winning book Speak Now Against the  Day: The Generation Before the Civil Rights Movement in the South, will deliver the 23rd Ralph McGill Lecture on Nov. 15 at 10:30 a.m. in the Chapel. His speech is entitled “McGill’s Army: Civil Rights Reporting, Then and Now.”
Egerton will discuss McGill’s influence on a generation of journalists, including John “Pop” Popham, the first Southern correspondent for The New York Times. McGill’s influence was far-reaching, according to Egerton.
“The South was ignored by the national press until the mid-’50s,” he says. “McGill was information central; people just knew to call him. He was the obligatory first stop.”
Born in Atlanta and raised in Kentucky, Egerton has lived and worked most of his life in the South. His work is heavily influenced by his native region and seeks connections between historical and contemporary Southern people, places and events.
Currently based in Nashville, Egerton is author of more than 500 articles and more than a dozen books that explore Southern history and culture, including Speak Now Against the Day, which won the Robert F. Kennedy Book Award, the Southern Book Critics Circle Award, the Ambassador Award of the English-Speaking Union and the Southeastern Library Association Award.
“John Egerton is one of the nation’s most astute interpreters of Southern culture, from race relations and journalism to food, families and politics,” says Kent Middleton, professor of journalism. “Like Ralph McGill, Egerton will challenge and enlighten us all.”
Egerton earned a bachelor’s degree in journalism/public relations and a master’s degree in political science/public administration at the University of Kentucky, but he has also spent time at UGA.
For years he attended the Popham Seminar, an annual event held in recent years at UGA which brought together members of the media who documented the South’s struggle with civil rights, diversity and civil liberty.
“It always feels good to come back to Athens,” Egerton says.
The lecture series honors the life of Ralph McGill, who is remembered for his editorials on civil rights.
McGill, whose reputation earned him the moniker “the conscience of the South,” enjoyed a journalism career spanning more than 40 years, including several years as editor and publisher of the Atlanta Constitution. |
|
