Mississippi Transplant: Jianqing "John" Zheng

"There’s a saying in my culture: A tree that is transplanted may die, and a person who is transplanted has a chance to survive."

What does it mean to call Mississippi home? Why do people choose to leave or live in this weird, wonderful, and sometimes infuriating place? Today we hear from the professor, photographer, and poet John Zheng.

Featured contributor, John Zheng.

Where are you from?

I’m originally from China, and geographically from a metropolitan river city in Central China where I lived for thirty-some years.

When did you move to Mississippi and why did you move here?

I moved to Mississippi in the summer of 1991 to pursue graduate studies. After teaching at a college for about ten years, I switched my role to being a graduate student at the University of Southern Mississippi. I was lucky to have the USM Foundation fellowship established by the late Dr. Don George and his wife Mrs. Nell George. My initial goal was to earn a doctoral degree in literature, but it turned out I had two concentrations—creative writing and modern literature—because Southern has such a gorgeous creative writing program that I wante…