Earlier this week the nominees were announced for the Mississippi Institute of Arts and Letters Awards in their seven categories. Oxford residents landed 13 nominations ranging from visual art to literature to music.

Each year the Mississippi Institute of Arts and Letters (MIAL) honors creative individuals with an award in their specific field. The awards were made in 1980, two years after a few individuals, including former Governor William Winter, created the MIAL.

Of the seven categories Oxford citizens were nominated in six of them. The only category without someone from Oxford nominated was photography. Of those six categories, there were multiple nominations for Oxford citizens in four of them.

The biggest number of Oxford nominations in one category was five for the nonfiction award. Kiese Laymon was nominated for ‘Heavy: An American Memior’, Kathyrn B. McKee was nominated for ‘Civil War South’, Ted Ownby’s ‘Hurtin’ Words: Debating Family Problems in the Twentieth-Century South’ earned a nomination as did Dustin Parsons’ ‘Exploded View’ and Jessica Wilkerson’s ‘Live Here, You Have to Fight’.

The visual arts, poetry and fiction categories had two Oxford nominees each.

In visual arts, Blair Hobbs’ ‘Unnatural History’ and Glennray Tutor’s ‘Portals’ received nominations. Water Valley’s Jonathan Kent Adams also earned a nomination in visual arts for his work titled ‘The Myth of the Beast.’

Ann Fisher-Wirth’s poem titled ‘Mississippi’ and Aimee Nezhukumatatil’s ‘Oceanic’ earned nods in the poetry category. In the fiction category Chris Offutt’s ‘Country Dark’ and Michael Farris Smith’s ‘The Fighter’ earned nominations.

Price Walden earned a nomination in the music competition-classical category for his piece titled ‘Sacred Spaces’ and the band Teardrop City earned a nomination in the music composition-contemporary category with their song ‘It’s Later Than You Think.’

The awards weekend will be held this summer in Jackson.