In November 2016, I was conducting part of my dissertation fieldwork and participating as a “formerly young” member of a month-long youth theater lab in Eastern Kentucky. I briefly returned home to vote in the US presidential election, and while driving back into town on election day, I took this photo of burning mountains next to the highway using a low-resolution camera on an old smartphone that my grandmother bought me. My ethnographic research includes interviewing and spending time with youth media makers and arts educators in media education programs and public regional events in Central Appalachia. This research also focuses on intergenerational mentorship relationships and networks that enable and support creative aspirations and livelihoods.
