Glass half-full or glass half-empty?

For the past 20 years, we’ve heard from academics, some politicians and various commentators that America is a deeply racist society. In response, some colleges, the federal government and certain corporations require employees and students take instruction in DEI, or diversity, equity and inclusion.

Western Carolina University will present the 2024 Mountain Heritage Awards during the Mountain Heritage Day festival Saturday, Sept. 28, on the Ingles Blue Ridge Stage around midday.  

A program on Cherokee culture will be presented at 10 a.m. Wednesday, July 17, at the Macon County Public Library in Franklin.

Museum of the Cherokee People has been awarded a major spring grant from the Cherokee Preservation Foundation.

Folkmoot USA is pleased to present “An African Cultural Experience,” which will feature Percussion Discussion Afrika and Chinobay at 7 p.m. Thursday, June 13, at the Folkmoot Friendship Center in Waynesville. 

As part of the “Pigeon Community Conversations with Storytellers Series,” author Ann Miller Woodford will interpret the legacy and culture of Western North Carolina’s African Americans at 6 p.m. Thursday, May 9, at the Pigeon Community Multicultural Development Center, located at 450 Pigeon Street in Waynesville. 

Stories abound in these here mountains, almost as countless as the towering trees that cloak those familiar slopes. But beneath the canopy, if you look close enough and listen hard, there’s a whole other crop of them that rarely see the light of day. 

Every year, the National Council for Black Studies, the preeminent professional Black studies organization, recognizes one academic program for outstanding achievement with the Sankore Institute Award. 

For those of you who don’t know her, Julia Nunnally Duncan is an award-winning freelance writer and author of 11 books of nonfiction, fiction and poetry who is a native of Western North Carolina whose hometown is Marion.

At mid-morning on Wednesday, Nov. 15, the fountain at the heart of Western Carolina University’s campus is a thoroughfare.