Most literature starts on paper. John W. Roberts is doing his best to preserve the oral history of black Southern folklore.

Formerly the deputy chairman of the National Endowment for the Humanities, Roberts is now associate dean of the College of Humanities at Ohio State University, as well as a professor of English and African-American and African studies.

His lecture, titled “Writing the Black South,” will be presented at 8 p.m. Monday at the Ames Public Library, 515 Douglas Ave.

“I think his lecture will explore what it means for writers to be born at a particular place and how that is manifested in their writing,” says Sheryl St. Germain, director of the Center for Excellence in Arts and Humanities.

The lecture, sponsored by Iowa State’s Center for Excellence in Arts and Humanities, is part of an effort to make Ames a culturally diverse city, St. Germain says.

“This is not an event that is meant to promote equity,” she says. “It just brings a different perspective. It enriches our climate tremendously to have someone like that here.”

Jim Dow, professor of foreign languages and literatures, recommended Roberts as a lecturer.

“Roberts is pertinent to Ames because he is a scholar who deals with writers, performers and the black South, which has been a long-neglected area pertinent not only to Ames, but to the country as well,” Dow says.

Roberts’ lecture will center around the folklore written by Ernest Gaines. Gaines, who was born in Louisiana, has written six novels in which all his settings are imaginary, but directly relate to the area in which he grew up.

St. Germain says folklore is best described as stories that were not written down, but instead passed down orally by cultures that were not literate. As they were passed down from generation to generation, those stories gathered power and eventually were written down, St. Germain says.

“I am personally looking forward to Roberts’ discussion of how Ernest Gaines uses [where he is from] to shape character,” St. Germain says.

“I hope people will get excited about the authors he is talking about. African-American folklore is not something we talk about much in the Midwest, but it is something we need to know about. It is a passionate, strong writing style that we need to be aware of.”

The lecture is one in a series of lectures sponsored by the Center for Excellence in Arts and Humanities. St. Germain says the theme of this year’s events is “Arts and Humanities in the Environment.” Previous lecturers have included Pulitzer Prize-winning author Annie Proulx; Scott Slovic, director of the Center for Environmental Arts and Humanities at the University of Nevada; environmental sculptor Ned Kahn and Native American author Winona LaDuke.

Although all previous events have taken place on campus, Roberts’ lecture is being held at the Ames Public Library.

“We are trying to do things to get the university community and the larger community together and we thought he could be someone to do that,” St. Germain says.