Poet, Environmentalist to Speak at GHC

Georgia poet and environmental activist Janisse Ray will present a reading of her work Wednesday at 1 p.m. in the library at in Cartersville in celebration of National Community College Poetry Day. 

Ray is best known for her autobiography, The Ecology of a Cracker Childhood, which won the American Book Award in 2000, the Southeastern Booksellers Award for Nonfiction in 1999, the Southern Environmental Law Center Award for Outstanding Writing on the Southern Environment and the Southern Book Critics Circle Award for Nonfiction.  The reading will be followed by a book signing. 

Besides The Ecology of a Cracker Childhood, Ray has also written Pinhook: Finding Wholeness in a Fragmented Land, Wildcard Quilt and A House of Branches, which is her latest. These books may be purchased at the reading and are currently available at the GHC and Barnes and Noble. 

Ray serves as a nature commentator of Georgia Public Radio and is a founding board member of Altamaha Riverkeeper. She helped form the Georgia Nature-Based Tourism Association and continues to work to preserve the 3,400-acre Moody Forest in Appling County.

Ray’s appearance is sponsored by Green Highlands, Phi Theta Kappa and Keep Bartow Beautiful. Because she is an avid environmentalist interested in the relationship among land use, personal responsibility and the health of our rivers and streams, she will be participating in a college project on the Rome and Cartersville campuses to add cautions to storm drains that flow into the Coosa River. 

The initiative to paint stencils that read, “Dump no waste; drains to the Coosa River,” will involve the program sponsors as well as the Georgia Highlands College Writers’ Collaborative and the Coosa River Basin Initiative. 

Admission to the readings is free and open to the general public.