Loyola Press Release
May 22, 2009
Twelve journalism students in the Loyola University
New Orleans College of Social Sciences are on an eight-day
tour of the Mississippi Delta, in search of stories
and photos along its historic blues trails.
The students, who are traveling with visiting journalism
professor Michael Perlstein, are enrolled in his Travel
and Culture Journalism class in the School of Mass Communication.
While in Mississippi, students travelled to Hazelhurst,
the birthplace of blues legend Robert Johnson; the B.B.
King Museum in Indianola; and to Clarksdale to report
on children learning blues music there. They then headed
north to Memphis, Tenn., to visit Graceland and the
Full Gospel Tabernacle Church, the church of soul-singer-turned-minister
Al Green. They also dropped in at several juke joints
and folk art museums along the way. At each stop, students
photographed and wrote about the scene. The depictions
of their journey can be seen at www.neworleans.com and
at www.newsplink.com.
Perlstein said the trip has provided a plethora of
story material for students to showcase the Mississippi
blues culture.
“The journey was full of surprises, like the
day we bumped into blues legend Mississippi Slim visiting
some old friends and shooting the breeze in Greenville.
He sang a couple of songs for us, and good thing too,
because it kept alive our streak of hearing authentic
blues and roots music every day of the trip,”
Perlstein said. “My students were equally surprising,
digging for hidden story angles, hustling to get remarkable
photos and immersing themselves in a culture that is
as elusive as it is amazing.”
Like students in Perlstein’s class last year,
who traveled to Belize and Guatemala, the “blues
travelers” will produce a multi-media spread for
Sunday Travel section of The Times-Picayune and its
affiliated Web site, nola.com.
For more information on the School of Mass Communication,
contact Catherine Koppel in the Office of Public Affairs
at 504-861-5448 or ckoppel@loyno.edu.
