The Many Souths

The present volume is based on lectures given at an international symposium held at the University of Vienna. Cultural and social historians and literary scholars from nine countries deal with a neglected topic, the representation of class in Southern culture, focusing in par­ticular on the marginalized group of ‘poor whites’. The analysis of early sociological descriptions of Southern society is followed by analyses of literary texts from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The texts analyzed mirror the pre­occupation of both reactionary and radical authors and journalists with the lower social classes. The critical investigations document the conservative tendencies in a society in which white men from the upper classes were privileged while tenant farmers and African-Americans functioned as the indispensable work force. Several essays also explore the overlapping of social and ethnic conflicts, which in the American South prevented solidarity across racial boundaries. They also examine the experiences of poor whites as reflected in their music, and study the hierarchies in Southern society. To conclude there are several essays in which the new self-confidence of white and black women writers from the lower social classes is illustrated. They exemplify the new voices which nowadays are an integral part of Southern literature, which thus eludes homogenization and demonstrates the pres­ence of multiple voices in a varied literary landscape.