The Unquiet Past and the Cursed Burial Ground

"When Two Feathers Fell From the Sky"

Join Columbia College's Dr. Jack Holcomb to discuss this year's One Read selection, especially the way the book approaches the historical desecration of burial sites and the narrative motif that arises from that. The trope of the haunted Indian graveyard appears all over popular culture of the last century. How is Margaret Verble transforming and re-interpreting this trope? Adults.

Come discuss this year's One Read book, "When Two Feathers Fell From the Sky," by Margaret Verble. Columbia College's Dr. Jack Holcomb is especially interested in the way the book approaches the historical desecration of burial sites and the narrative motif that arises from that. The trope of the haunted Indian graveyard appears all over popular culture of the last century, especially in horror of the seventies and eighties — so much so that it is now a punchline. How is author Margaret Verble transforming and re-interpreting this trope? Is she reconciling the tensions that give the trope itspower?

This program will be led by Jack Holcomb, who earned his Ph.D. in folkloristics at University of Louisiana at Lafayette in 2000, having convinced his actually quite rigorous dissertation director that Dungeons & Dragons players constitute a “folk.”  He has worked at the University of Missouri, Truman State and now Columbia College in a range of roles including adjunct professor, academic advisor, director of a tutoring program, department administrator and student success coach.

Find out more about One Read here.

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