Bibliograph

White trash, the 400-year untold history of class in America, Nancy Isenberg

Type

Label

White trash, the 400-year untold history of class in America, Nancy Isenberg

Language

eng

Bibliography note

Includes bibliographical references and index

Illustrations

illustrations

Index

index present

Literary Form

non fiction

Main title

White trash

Nature of contents

bibliography

Responsibility statement

Nancy Isenberg

Sub title

the 400-year untold history of class in America

Summary

"A history of the class system in America from the colonial era to the present illuminates the crucial legacy of the underprivileged white demographic, citing the pivotal contributions of lower-class white workers in wartime, social policy, and the rise of the Republican Party."--NoveListThe wretched and landless poor have existed from the time of the earliest British colonial settlement. They were alternately known as "waste people," "offals," "rubbish," "lazy lubbers," and "crackers." By the 1850s, the downtrodden included so-called "clay eaters" and "sandhillers," known for prematurely aged children distinguished by their yellowish skin, ragged clothing, and listless minds. In White Trash, we acknowledge racial injustice as an ugly stain on our nation's history. With Isenberg's landmark book, we will have to face the truth about the enduring, malevolent nature of class as well

Table Of Contents

Fables we forget by -- To begin the world anew. Taking out the trash : waste people in the New World ; John Locke's Lubberland : the settlements of Carolina and Georgia ; Benjamin Franklin's American breed : the demographics of mediocrity ; Thomas Jefferson's rubbish : a curious topography of class ; Andrew Jackson's cracker country : the squatter as common man -- Degeneration of the American Breed. Pedigree and poor white trash : bad blood, half-breeds and clay-eaters ; Cowards, Poltroons, and mudsills : civil war as class warfare ; Thoroughbreds and scalawags : bloodlines and bastard stock in the age of eugenics ; Forgotten men and poor folk : downward mobility and the Great Depression ; The cult of the country boy : Elvis Presley, Andy Griffith, and LBJ's Great Society -- The white trash makeover. Redneck roots : Deliverance, Billy Beer, and Tammy Faye ; Outing Rednecks : slumming, Slick Willie, and Sarah Palin -- America's strange breed : the long legacy of white trash

Target audience

adult

Classification