Race and Region-South
•
•
The making of a New South, culture of segregation, way that consequences of the
civil war (boost in technology, infrastructure, etc.) go hand in hand with reaction to
emancipation.
South as national mythology and regional folklore. Idea that South becomes
etched as a national other—place that is exoticized in plantation romance. But
Southerners also take this up in the lost cause-invention of myths and tales that
will dominate Southern culture for a century.
•
•
Background to New South
Rise of Segregation
-Plessy v. Ferguson (1896)
-Williams v. Mississippi (1898)
•
Culture of Segregation
-Plantation Romance and stock images
-Racial Violence
•
Lost Cause Mythology
-South as escape
-National Reunion
Imperial Laundry, 1930s
Image courtesy of Schomberg Center for Research in Black
Culture, New York Public Library
Segregated water coolers
Image courtesy of Prints and Photographs Division,
Library of Congress
Sign,
“Colored
Waiting
Room”
Rome, GA,
1943
(Courtesy of
Library of
Congress)
Ad from
Ladies
Home
Journal,
December
1925 for
Aunt Jemima
pancake
flour.
From the
Dave
Thomson
collection.
Cover of the
promotional
pamphlet, "Life of
Aunt Jemima," c.
1895. Published by
R. T. Davis Mill,
St. Joseph,
Missouri. Private
Collection, Los
Angeles.
Aunt Jemima Image, 1894—
Part of program for
performance of Uncle Tom’s
Cabin
Ceramic Mammy sprinkler featuring black mammy in maid's outfit with
hands on hips. Original sprinkling plus comes out of the back of her
head. Unmarked and measures 7" tall.
The cover
of the first
edition of
Legends
of the Old
Plantation
(1881)
Joel
Chandler
Harris
Edward A. Pollard wrote the "new
southern history of the war of the
Confederates" in 1866. Below are
excerpts from that text. A former
newspaper editor, Pollard criticized
Davis for being a weak leader. Pollard
was later named professor of Southern
history at the University of Virginia.