Corey Topping
Stereotypes
Images the mainstream media evokes people in the backwoods Appalachian
culture have remained consistent through time. The region’s population may appear
poor, lazy, isolated, violent, illiterate, but they also have common sense, individual spirit,
loyally, and possess a deep knowledge of their environment. Such images come from the
countless references of Appalachia in many forms of popular American culture media.
They not only distort mountaineers, but they emphasize hillbillies who were in a world
separate but close to home in the isolated beauty of Appalachia that most Americans have
never seen or experience.
We create stereotypes by taking the characteristics of a few individuals known
and apply them to a whole group of people. This process helps us make it through the
world by acquiring experience to negotiate the social aspect of getting along with our
peers. Before long we categorize people on sight as jocks, nerds, burnouts, geeks, or
whatever labels evolve in the many different neighborhoods. Every stereotype has some
basis in truth. Making easy generalizations by painting everyone with the same brush can
bring danger. Dumb jocks can also be smart athletes.
Even though some people in Appalachia may be poor violent, illiterate, and lazy
does not mean the entire region should be characterized that way. Media representations
common to hillbillies imply these images represent all that is essential about its people.
The reduced stereotype of a complex regional society of diverse groups to a set of simple
characteristics teaches us that no people or place can be described uniformly. The details
of who, what, when, and where do mater. Stereotypes deceive us into seeing the world as
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black or white when we should be looking for the many shades of grey and the many
other colors as well.
As familiar as we are to the act of stereotyping, understanding it needs
examination of how the images came to be applied to the mountains. Consider two
theories. The idea of Appalachia as a distinct region and culture came about when those
outside the mountains felt a need to make them “other” people. Visitors to the region
assume the unified character of American civilization. Unexplored or underdeveloped
parts of the United states such as the Appalachians is worthy of study for its geological
features and human society that developed there. By the 1870’s, Appalachia had began
to seen differently as another discrete region in but of America.
The “local color” genre of fiction literary movement emerged as a response to the
existence of a market for descriptive pieces new middle class readers would find
interesting. It gave a perception of the peculiarity of life in the little corners of America.
The images local colorist produced of mountaineers on the ir society included both
positive and negative traits. It depicted the characters as physically isolated from the rest
of America and the men spent their days feuding, drinking, and hunting while women
spun thread and wove clothes.
Northern Protestant denominations had begun missionary activities using religion
and education to lift the people out of the isolation and into mainstream American life.
Religion and knowledge go with churches and schools assisting each other. The
missionary work in the south struck a great mass of illiteracy among whites at this time.
Typical American society was seen by the more urban culture in which they lived.
Mountaineer peculiarity could not explain living on some distant frontier or being
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ethnically inferior people. By the turn of the twentieth century, they came to explain by
defining Appalachia as a non American place defined by a particular pattern of culture as
well as by location inhabited by a legitimately distinct population. The contemporary
ancestor generalization took place for stereotypes to arise.
The stereotypes did not develop until the last quarter of the nineteenth century
when society seemed to have developed different ways than Appalachian society did.
Life around Chesapeake Bay did not differ much from the Blue Ridge. Difference grew
from people taking notice they were remarkable and wrote about them in national
publications. The outsiders created and publicized the stereotypical images of
Appalachia. Missionaries and educators from outside the region formed a common
theme that ran through these images.
Research reveals another process that the mountaineer’s were never cut off from
the larger American society, and never so isolated the characteristics the color writers
described. Instead, differences began to appear within the population. The topography of
the region with more open rolling valleys made movement and communication easier in
some places than others. Two ways of seeing the world developed as some who could
travel easily had an outward looking perspective and tended to see their interest
connected to regional markets and national issues. Other who had difficulty moving out
developed a more inward turning local perspective. These people tended to be concerned
with immediate neighbors and local matters. The folks with an outward looking
perspective
Consider others who read the local paper and talk about business downtown or
debate outcome of election, these people have more of an inward looking perspective.
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Everyone hold a mixture of some sort, but most tend to hold one perspective more than
the other. People tend to stick together who have similar views and began to develop as
in east Tennessee as inhabitants developed self perception of difference. The stereotypes
began to crystallize at midcentury when the better connected outward oriented inhabitants
campaigned for the East Tennessee and Virginia Rail Road, which allowed farmers to
reach new markets quickly and manufacturers distributed their products more easily. The
railroad would open out those in East Tennessee that had been so long hidden and
facilitate the necessary ties to make them a happy and prosperous people.
Two points stand out when considering this theory. The first, the sense of
distinctiveness began within the region, not from outside of it. Second the theory draws
on detailed records for one locale as opposed to a broader use of records concerning the
entire mountain region. One theory or another is not necessarily better or right. The
issue of stereotypes is so complex the tone should expect it would take many different
approaches to understand the subject. When wrestling with questions and theories pone
must use their own brain critically and analytically to come to an informed conclusion.
Doing so will avoid the lazy thinking that gave rise to the stereotype in the first place.
Understanding stereotypes origins may be difficult. The image of Appalachia
hillbillies can mean just about anything. It has remained unchanged for 150 years and
given the political, economic, social, and cultural changes in the United States over that
time is amazing. Its staying power from evolution in response to those changes in
American society has been the fundamental ambiguity of the meaning of this term and
image.
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Many manifestations of the hillbilly representations held and challenged
dominant trends of the twentieth century American life. The hillbilly is a negotiated
myth through which modern Americans attempted to define themselves and the national
identity to reconcile the past and the present. Some argue that the images are popular
because people use them for profit and some accept the stereotypes because putting down
somebody else, they feel better about themselves. Everyone feels reassured about their
own standing if someone else is standing underneath them. Stereotypes may be popular
because the serve as release of mainstream fears.
The most interesting example to analyze Appalachian stereotypes began in 1977
by local Shriners, The Hillbilly Days Festival in Kentucky, to raise money for children
hospital burn centers. More than 100,000 visitors came into town for the states largest
annual gathering behind the Kentucky Derby. Activities included music, a kiddy
carnival, square dancing, arts and crafts, and the Hillbilly Parade. Thousands dressed up
in garb carrying moonshine jugs and wound their way through the streets of Pikeville.
There is a fine line between being proud of our heritage and trying to dispel it.
The meaning and implications of Appalachian stereotypes is mainly now about money
and there is no reason to suspect it will not endure for another hundred years. The images
continually surround us, and it seems our power to control them is not in our hands. Our
power to interpret then in ways that take into consideration the people of the past and
present is.
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