Description
Book SynopsisOriginally published in 1979. The idea of the South has its roots in Romanticism and American culture of the nineteenth century. This study by Michael O'Brien analyzes how the idea of a unique Southern consciousness endured into the twentieth century and how it affected the lives of prominent white Southern intellectuals. Individual chapters treat Howard Odum, John Donald Wade, John Crowe Ransom, Allen Tate, Frank Owsley, and Donald Davidson. The chapters trace each man's growing need for the idea of the Southhow each defined it and how far each was able to sustain the idea as an element of social analysis. The Idea of the American South moves the debate over Southern identity from speculative essays about the central theme of Southern history and, by implication, past the restricted perception that race relations are a sufficient key to understanding the history of Southern identity.
Table of ContentsPreface to the paperback edition
Acknowledgments
Introduction
Part I. The Legacy
Chapter 1. On the Idea of the South: Origins, Mutation, and Fragmentation
Part II. The Sociological Vision: Howard Odum
Chapter 2. Odum: Sociology in the South
Chapter 3. Odum: Southern Sociology
Chapter 4. Odum: The Failure of Regionalism entr'acte: A Still Point: John Wade
Chapter 5. Wade: A Turning Inward
Part III. The Reaction to Modernism: The Southern Agrarians
Chapter 6. John Ransom: The Cycle of Commitment
Chapter 7. Allen Tate: 'The Punctilious Abyss"
Chapter 8. Frank Owsley: 'The Immoderate Past"
Chapter 9. Donald Davidson: "The Creed of Memory"
Part IV. The Survival of Southern Identity
Chapter 10. The Idea of the South: An Interpretation
Notes
Bibliographical note
Index
