Shelley Buffalo, visual artist and Food Sovereignty Coordinator with the Meskwaki Nation, is the featured guest on the latest episode of a new podcast “Mid-Americana: Stories from a Changing Midwest.” Mid-Americana explores the history and identity of the Greater Midwest through the lives and stories of individual people. The debut season, with the theme “Homecoming,” features eight native Iowans who left the Midwest and came back to stay. It details what pulled them away, what drew them back and what they contribute now to a changing Midwest.

The podcast is a project of Central College professors Joshua Dolezal, professor of English, and Brian Campbell, director of sustainability education, who recently joined “Talk of Iowa” host Charity Nebbe to discuss the project. Dolezal visited the Meskwaki Settlement in September to record the podcast episode, which will be released on December 4. In the interview, Buffalo discussed her childhood on and near the Settlement, her lifelong identification with the punk rock community, and how her work in food sovereignty may mean more to future generations than to her own.

Buffalo’s interview is the fifth episode of Mid-Americana, following conversations with RAYGUN founder Mike Draper, Dawn Martinez Oropeza, executive director of Al Exito, a mentoring and youth empowerment organization that works with hundreds of middle and high school-aged Latinos across Iowa, Megan McKay, the founder and owner of Peace Tree Brewing Company in Knoxville, Iowa, and Brian Bruening, owner of Schera’s Algerian-American Restaurant in Elkader.

The podcast is available on the website:

www.midamericana.com and can be downloaded through Apple, Google Play, Spotify and Stitcher. Additional episodes will be released every other Wednesday through mid-January. The website includes transcripts and illustrations for each interview, plus opportunities to submit feedback and ideas for future episodes. Possible themes for upcoming seasons of “Mid-Americana” include agriculture, immigration, climate change, education, energy, religion and more.

In June, Campbell and Dolezal received an $18,630 grant from Humanities Iowa, a state-based affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities. The mission of Humanities Iowa is to promote understanding and appreciation of the people, culture and stories of importance to Iowa and the nation.