2 p.m. - 3 p.m.

Rising Tide is pleased to have New Orleans based writer and filmmaker Lolis Eric Elie as a keyote speaker at Rising Tide 7. Lolis is ubiquitous. Whether you know his work from the HBO series Treme or his thrice weekly column ('95-'09) in the SomeTimes-Picayune, if you're from New Orleans you know his work. A recognized expert on New Orleans food and culture his writing has appeared in The Oxford American, Gourmet, The Washington Post, The New York Times, Bon Appetit, Downbeat and The San Francisco Chronicle among other publications. A former commentator for CBS News Sunday Morning, he has also appeared often on National Public Radio programs.

Keynote: Lolis Eric Elie 
"At War With Ourselves: New Orleans Culture at the Crossroads . . . Again . .  . And Again . . . . And . . . "
In the matter of jass, New Orleans is particularly interested, since it has been widely suggested that this particular form of musical vice had its birth in this city -- that it came, in fact, from doubtful surroundings in our slums. We do not recognized the honor of parenthood, but with such a story in circulation, it behooves us to be last to accept the atrocity in polite society, and where it has crept in we should make it a point of civic honor to suppress it. Its musical value is nil, and its possibilities of harm are great. 
- Times-Picayune editorial, June 20, 1918 (page 4, Column 2)

Bio: Lolis Eric Elie is a New Orleans based writer and filmmaker. Most recently, he joined the staff of the HBO series Treme. Working with the award-winning director Dawn Logsdon, he coproduced and wrote the PBS documentary, Faubourg Treme: the Untold Story of Black New Orleans. His essay, “America’s Greatest Hits,” is included in Best African American Essays: 2009.

From 1995 to 2009, he wrote a thrice-weekly column for the New Orleans’ Times-Picayune. A recognized expert on New Orleans food and culture, he is the author of Smokestack Lightning: Adventures in the Heart of Barbecue Country and co-producer and writer of Smokestack Lightning: A Day in the Life of Barbecue, the documentary based on that book. He is editor of Cornbread Nation 2: The Best of Southern Food Writing.

A contributing writer to The Oxford American, his work has appeared in Gourmet, The Washington Post, The New York Times, Bon Appetit, Downbeat and The San Francisco Chronicle among other publications. His work is included in the anthologies Best Food Writing: 2008, Streetlights: Illuminating Tales of the Urban Black Experience, and That‘s What I Like (About the South: and Other New Southern Stories for the Nineties). A former commentator for CBS News Sunday Morning, he has also appeared often on National Public Radio programs.

He has an MA from the Columbia School of Journalism in New York and an MFA from the University of Virginia.