Set between 1950 and 1963, this coming-of-age memoir discusses one of America’s most taboo subjects: social class. Combining recollections, accounts, and analysis, this book leans on Maw, Pap, Ony Mae, and other members of this rambunctious Scots-Irish family to chronicle the often heartbreaking postwar journey of 22 million rural Americans into the cities, where they became the foundation of a permanent white underclass. Telling the stories of the gun-owning, uninsured, underemployed white tribes inhabiting America’s heartlands, this record offers an intimate look at what was lost in the orchestrated postwar shift from an agricultural to an urban consumer society.
Introduction Lost in the American Undertow 1
1 A Panther in a Sycamore Tree 11
2 The Politics of Plenty 34
3 An Empire of Dirt 59
4 Behold the City! 81
5 Mama's People: whiskey, blood, and prayer 114
6 Son of a Blue Goose 139
7 Class Rules 151
8 A Culture of Shame 173
9 Lunchpails and Laptops 192
10 The Oligarch's Complaint 214
11 Draw Me! 238
12 The Sediment of Memory 256
13 Over Home is Over With 275
14 A Long-Promised Road 290
Anonymous
Posted June 25, 2011
No text was provided for this review.
Anonymous
Posted May 15, 2011
No text was provided for this review.
Overview
Set between 1950 and 1963, this coming-of-age memoir discusses one of America’s most taboo subjects: social class. Combining recollections, accounts, and analysis, this book leans on Maw, Pap, Ony Mae, and other members of this rambunctious Scots-Irish family to chronicle the often heartbreaking postwar journey of 22 million rural Americans into the cities, where they became the foundation of a permanent white underclass. Telling the stories of the gun-owning, uninsured, underemployed white tribes inhabiting ...