NATCHITOCHES – Northwestern State University will host the 17th Annual Louisiana Studies Conference Saturday, Sept. 13 in the Creative and Performing Arts Complex. Presentation sessions will begin on Saturday morning at 9:30 a.m. and run until 4:45 p.m.. Scholars from throughout Louisiana as well as Florida, New York, Tennessee and Texas will make presentations on aspects of Louisiana theater, films, musicals, folklore, history and literature. Admission to the conference is free and open to the public.
This year’s conference theme is Louisiana Dramas. Throughout the day more than 30 scholars, cultural authorities and creative writers will make presentations. Some of the many topics to be discussed include Louisiana archaeology, dance, foodways, history, indigenous peoples, language, literature, music, narratives, politics and symphonies. Creative writers will also address the conference theme, including playwright John P. Doucet, poet Bernard Gallagher and musician Max Turner.
“Louisiana’s rich culture has given so much to the country and even the world. Attendees at this year’s conference will get an increased sense of the dramas, challenges, and struggles encompassed in our shared history, culture, music and literature,” said Dr. Shane Rasmussen, director of NSU’s Louisiana Folklife Center and co-chair of the conference. “Louisiana’s culture reflects its people, who are creative, resilient and caring. The conference is free and open to the public, and we want to invite anyone who is interested in Louisiana culture, traditions and history to join us and to take part in these conversations”
The Saturday morning keynote, “A Mythical State We Call Louisiana: Place, Politics, and Performance in Louisiana Purchase,” will be given by Dr. Sean Bartley, associate professor of theatre history at Northwestern State. Bartley’s research centers on contemporary experiential and immersive theatre practices, postdigital pedagogy and the intersections of sport and performance. He is the co-editor (with William Lewis) of “Experiential Theatres: Praxis-Based Approaches to Training 21st Century Theatre Artists” and the series “Advances in Experiential Media and Performance.”
According to Bartley, his presentation will discuss the 1940 play “Louisiana Purchase” by legendary Broadway composer Irving Berlin and his collaborators, librettist Morrie Ryskind and producer B.G. DeSylva, which savagely satirized Huey Long (known to his allies and enemies alike as “The Kingfish”) and the corrupt Democratic Party officials who dominated Louisiana Politics in the late 1920s and 1930s. The show is paradoxically a quintessential “Louisiana Drama” and a total imposter, created by collaborators who had never visited the Pelican State who based their depiction on the popular culture depictions of earlier eras. Bartley will explore how in “Louisiana Purchase,” Berlin, Ryskind and DeSylva twisted the conventions of the Broadway musical comedy and utilized the simultaneously real and imagined setting of New Orleans to soften the sting of their satirical take on political life.
His lecture will be punctuated by video of musical numbers from the 1941 Paramount Pictures film adaptation (starring Bob Hope) and two live scenes directed and performed by NSU Theatre and Dance students KeShaun Bridgewater, Jezek Maxwell, Haleigh Miller, Amaya Perkins and Tyler Sibley.
Bartley’s address will be followed by the presentation of the winning essays from the 17th Annual NSU Louisiana High School Essay Contest. Writing on the 2025 contest theme “Louisiana Dramas,” entrants wrote a literary analysis addressing a play or dramatic musical, performed a performance of a song from a dramatic musical or a monologue from a play or wrote a short one act play set in Louisiana.
Several of the winning essays will be presented at the conference and all will be published in the Louisiana Folklife Journal, the Louisiana Folklife Center’s scholarly journal. This year’s contest winners are Lalani Williams of Southside High School in Youngsville for her first-place winning play “Bayou Secrets,” Ashlyn Underwood of West Monroe High School for her second place winning performance of “Cabaret,” Liss Gabriella Navarro Hernandez of Chalmette High School for her third place winning play “The Haunting,” Ellise Bryant of C.E. Byrd High School for her Honorable Mention winning play “Ghosts” and E’Mantyi Mosby of Airline High School for her Honorable Mention winning essay “Desire’s Baleful Cradle: A Streetcar Named Desire.”
Dr. Rebecca Macijeski, associate professor of English and coordinator of the Creative Writing Program at NSU stated, “It’s a privilege to be able to spend time with work by young writers from all over the state each year. The range of creativity, research and expression is always inspiring. If I get to work with writers like these in the Creative Writing Program at NSU, I will be one lucky individual.”
A complete conference schedule can be found on the Louisiana Folklife Center’s website at https://www.nsula.edu/folklife/louisianastudies/. For more information call the Folklife Center at (318) 357-4332.
The Conference is co-sponsored by the Louisiana Folklife Center, the Department of English, Languages, and Cultural Studies, and the Northwestern State College of Arts and Sciences, as well as a generous grant from the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities. The views, findings, conclusions or recommendations expressed in this program will not necessarily represent those of the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities.