Posted on November 15, 2001 at 5:00 p.m.

BIRMINGHAM, AL — Scholars of Southern history and culture have written many narratives over the years, discussing and defining those unique perspectives on life that have created and perpetuate the mystic of the South. Their themes have included culture, honor, violence and religion. These narratives are the subject of a new book edited by Glenn Feldman, Ph.D., titled Reading Southern History: Essays on Interpreters and Interpretations, published by the University of Alabama Press.

The collection sheds light on a wide range of themes important to Southern history, including the plight of poor whites, race, debates over race and class, the "reconstruction syndrome," continuity vs. discontinuity in relation to blacks and whites, and regional culture and distinctiveness.

“The book is, in essence, a history of Southern history, really,” Feldman said. “It attempts to examine the ideas of Southern history’s major scholars, how those ideas originated, what they mean, and how they have been reacted to over the years.”

Feldman is an assistant professor of history at the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) Center for Labor Education and Research (CLEAR). His 376-page book is a compilation of essays written by him and 19 other historians from around the country.

The book includes 18 chapters on notable historians such as John Hope Franklin, Anne Firor Scott, Frank L. Owsley, W.J. Cash and C. Vann Woodward written by researchers, historians and emerging scholars, including Jacquelyn Dowd Hall, John Shelton Reed, Bruce Clayton and Ted Owenby.

The essays examine the major work or works of each historian or scholar as well as that person’s overall contribution to the study of Southern history.

Feldman teaches labor education history at UAB’s Center for Labor Education and Research (CLEAR). He also is the prize-winning author of Politics, Society, and the Klan in Alabama, 1915-1949 (University of Alabama Press, 1999) and From Demagogue to Dixiecrat: Horace Wilkinson and the Politics of Race (University Press of America, 1995).

For review copies, please contact:
Beth Motherwell, Marketing Manager
The University of Alabama Press
Box 870380
Tuscaloosa, AL 35487-0380
Telephone: (205) 348-7108
E-mail: emother@uapress.ua.edu