Last week, the South got kicked around the blogosphere a bit, and I'm partly to blame.The occasion was the publication of this widely-read piece on the "southern" oligarchy's takeover of American politics at AlterNet and Salon, which draws partly on my book, American Nations, and at this writing has over 4000 Facebook likes.
For those who are interested in the discussion, I contributed my two cents over at Washington Monthly.
By coincidence, I recently reviewed a topical book for the current issue of Washington Monthly, Chuck Thompson's Better Off Without 'Em: A Northern Manifesto for Southern Secession, which posted online just yesterday. (Teaser: I have a more pessimistic view of the human condition which gives me pause about the certainty of a proposed breakup being peaceful.)
What should we make of Atlanta, Ga? From a cultural/political view, is the whole metropolis slowly migrating north (out of the Deep South) or is it splitting on a north/south basis? Maybe it is already in Greater Appalachia but still moving north? Confused.
ReplyDelete@Holman. In American Nations terms, Atlanta is in the Deep South, although near the border with Greater Appalachia. The paradigm argues that foundational settlement groups lay down the cultural DNA for the regions the first settled/colonized, and that the rest of us have to deal with when we show up. Atlanta, in those terms, is very much the Deep South.
ReplyDeleteThat's not to say that you can't end up with considerable variation within a given nation. You have enclaves of outlanders embedded in many nations -- Midlanders in (Yankee) Milwaukee, Borderlanders in parts of southern New Hampshire and Midcoast Maine, Italians in Istrian Croatia, Germans in Ukraine, Slovak villages in the hills above Budapest, Hungary and so on -- or more "liberal" cities within conservative nations and vice versa (will Munich and Hamburg ever see eye to eye? Austin and Houston? St. Petersburg and Moscow?)
It seems to me that the Republican Party has become the party of Jefferson Davis, even if it had started out as the party of Abraham Lincoln. Senator Trent Lott once stated "The spirit of Jefferson Davis lives in the 1984 Republican platform."
ReplyDeleteAlso, how might these regional cultures fit in with Arthur Schlesinger's cycles of US history? CYCLES OF AMERICAN HISTORY
I must admit not having read The Cycles of American History, but will add it to my reading list.
DeleteThe Southern Formula for Freedom was worked out in the years after the Revolution:
ReplyDeleteWeak Government + White Supremacy = Freedom
It may be a dark legacy, but it wasn't crazy at the time. There are rational, if depressing, reasons this view of the world emerged.
From the Houston Chronicle: Is Obama Trying to Enslave You? http://blog.chron.com/goplifer/2012/07/is-obama-trying-to-enslave-you/
Thanks for sharing your post, Chris; a fascinating window into the Deep Southern psyche. I can't say I agree with the interpretation - the Deep Southern elite have always wanted a weak central government precisely so they could lord over the rest of their state's inhabitants -- but if indeed your ideas are widely held it would explain how the oligarchy in your region has continued to carry on unchallenged.
DeleteJust finished American Nations, and adored it. I must say, though, that as a lifelong resident of Appalachian Virginia and Deep Southern Mississippi and Louisiana, I think that your estimation of the Deep Southern psyche is, while accurate, a bit paranoid and extreme.
ReplyDeleteThanks much. I'm glad you grant it accuracy at least.
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