Keeping Cajun: A Conversation with Longtime Champion of Acadian and Cajun Culture Warren Perrin and ULL Center for Louisiana Studies Director Josh Caffery

Join us for a conversation on Acadian culture and heritage—and the importance of advocacy in maintaining Cajun identity—with one of the LEH’s 2020 Lifetime Contributions to the Humanities awardees, Warren Perrin. Perrin will be in conversation with folklorist and Center for Louisiana Studies and UL Press Director Josh Caffery. Audience Q & A will follow.

2020 Lifetime Contributions to the Humanities awardee Warren Perrin is a longtime supporter and defender of Cajun culture. A native of Vermilion Parish, one of Perrin’s most striking projects was his long but ultimately successful lobbying for recognition of the wrongs committed by the British Crown during the Acadian expulsion of 1755. Her Majesty Elizabeth II formally acknowledged those wrongs in 2003, with a proclamation recognizing July 28th as an annual day of commemoration. Perrin also established, along with Weldon Granger, the non-profit Acadian Heritage & Culture Foundation, which operates the Acadian Museum in Erath, Louisiana. He is currently at work on a bid to gain UNESCO recognition of early Acadian settlements as world heritage sites, continuing his advocacy for the recognition and celebration of Cajun culture at the global level.

Dr. Josh Caffery is a musician, teacher, and scholar, and has been the director of the Center for Louisiana Studies and UL Press since 2018. He is the author of the books Traditional Music in Coastal Louisiana, a study of some of the area’s earliest field recordings, and In the Creole Twilight, a collection of poetry, both from LSU Press. His work with vernacular music in the area has earned him Grammy nominations as both a musician and a producer. He is also the Vice President of the Louisiana Folklore Society.

This program is part of Bright Lights Online: Conversations with the 2020 LEH Humanities Awardees.