The Indicted South: Public Criticism, Southern Inferiority, and the Politics of Whiteness

by Angie Maxwell

Overview

By the 1920s, the sectional reconciliation that had seemed achievable after Reconstruction was foundering, and the South was increasingly perceived and portrayed as impoverished, uneducated, and backward. In this interdisciplinary study, Angie Maxwell examines and connects three key twentieth-century moments in which the South was exposed to intense public criticism, identifying in white southerners' responses a pattern of defensiveness that shaped the region's political and cultural conservatism.

Maxwell exposes the way the perception of regional inferiority confronted all types of southerners, focusing on the 1925 Scopes trial in Dayton, Tennessee, and the birth of the anti-evolution movement; the publication of I'll Take My Stand and the turn to New Criticism by the Southern Agrarians; and Virginia's campaign of Massive Resistance and Interposition in response to the Brown v. Board of Education decision. Tracing the effects of media scrutiny and the ridicule that characterized national discourse in each of these cases, Maxwell reveals the reactionary responses that linked modern southern whiteness with anti-elitism, states' rights, fundamentalism, and majoritarianism.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781469611655
Publisher:	The University of North Carolina Press
Publication date:	04/15/2014
Series:	New Directions in Southern Studies
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	324
File size:	591 KB

About the Author

Angie Maxwell is Diane D. Blair Assistant Professor of Southern Studies at the University of Arkansas.

Table of Contents

By the 1920s, the sectional reconciliation that had seemed achievable after Reconstruction was foundering, and the South was increasingly perceived and portrayed as impoverished, uneducated, and backward. In this interdisciplinary study, Maxwell examines and connects three key twentieth-century moments in which the South was exposed to intense public criticism, identifying in white southerners' responses a pattern of defensiveness that shaped the region's political and cultural conservatism.

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

An insightful, well-researched and very readable book, which captures a pivotal era in southern history. It should appeal to readers in historical and literary studies as well as to the general reader interested in the twentieth-century South.—Fred Hobson, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill



Maxwell focuses on three significant episodes in the history of the twentieth century South: the Scopes trial, the Fugitives' defense of Southern Agrarianism, and the construction of the ideology of massive resistance. In each case, she has done an excellent job of contextualizing events and conveying a sense of the atmosphere in which they unfolded. Maxwell's book provides a nuanced understanding of the mindset behind southern whites' defiance of external pressures for changes in southern society, one that goes beyond the reliance on rather simplistic devices such as a 'siege mentality' or the mere persistence of sectional antagonism. An important and significant book.—James C. Cobb, author of Redefining Southern Culture: Mind and Identity in the Modern South

Editorial Reviews

Highly recommended.—Choice



An ambitious, carefully researched, and well-written study.—Journal of American History



Expands the canon on whiteness generally and brings new depth to research on southern whiteness—American Studies



Maxwell's insightful reading of previous studies covering her three fulcrums of southern history and deft parsing of motives and ideas demonstrate the usefulness of her approach.—Arkansas Historical Quarterly



An ambitious, carefully researched, and well-written study that helps academics and general readers better understand the history of the mid-twentieth-century South and the roots of contemporary conservatism.—Journal of American History



A well-researched and often stylishly written study of the intellectual history of the twentieth-century South.—Register of the Kentucky Historical Society



Well written...Provides a fine model for studies of other regions, will serve as a point of comparison, and will be read with interest by a variety of scholars.—Middle West Review

From the Publisher