Raising the Story is a collaborative program that makes research and scholarship relevant to contemporary life in creative ways. RTS was created and is managed by Barbara Garrity-Blake and Susan West, who collaborate with individuals, organizations, and institutions to bring scholarship into the public square.
Barbara Garrity-Blake is a cultural anthropologist and author. She teaches marine fisheries policy at the Duke University Marine Laboratory. She's author of Living at the Water's Edge (UNC Press, with Karen Amspacher), Fish House Opera (Mystic Seaport Press, with Susan West) and The Fish Factory (University of Tennessee Press). For fun, she and her husband play in the Unknown Tongues Cajun Zydeco Band, and manage two festivals: Gloucester Mardi Gras and Wild Caught Local Seafood and Music Festival.
Susan West of Hatteras Island is a journalist and fisheries/local foods activist. She has served on the board of the local seafood branding program NC Catch and has long helped organize the Day at the Docks Festival in Hatteras Village. For many years she served on the NC Joint Legislative Commission on Seafood and Aquaculture. She is the creator of the Hollyhock Run blog, where she shares her writings and sells curiosities and collectibles.
The name "Raising the Story" comes from a 2010 NC Humanities Council funded project called "Raising the Story of Menhaden Fishing" led by Garrity-Blake in collaboration with fishermen and the Core Sound Waterfowl Museum and Heritage Center. The oral history project "raised the story" of workers concerned that their way of life would be forgotten as the last menhaden factory in North Carolina was torn down.
Contact Garrity-Blake and West at raisingthestory@gmail.com.