Jeremiad against the machine

Published in 1930 by a group of 12 Southern writers based in Vanderbilt College, I'll Take My Stand: The South and the Agrarian Tradition is a collection of essays issued as a stay against further industrialization of the South. Obviously they failed. In many respects the South is no different from any other region in the US. Regionalism has given way to a corporatized banality. The last bastion of yeoman farmers lost out to Detroit and other industrial powerhouses in the late 30s and 40s.
At times racist and patronizing, bitter and nostalgic, prophetic and prescient, I'll Take My Stand desperately tries to convince the South to keep her identity, but to no avail.
The essays offer no practical advice, merely polemic, but some of them...whew. What would the world be like if their ideas had prevailed? There is no way of knowing...at least not until the oil runs out. And that shouldn't happen for another 250 years--right?

Comments

Worth Quoting

There are but three social arrangements which can replace Capitalism: Slavery, Socialism, and Property. --Hilaire Belloc ...

Independent Women?

During breakfast today I was reading an excerpt from a play in The New York Times Magazine (I know, I was a day behind and read Saturday's edition yesterday) entitled Rust . The play, written by a professor at Grand Valley State University, here in Michigan, is a nonfiction drama about the closing of a GM plant in Wyoming, MI. The play itself sounds interesting and I enjoyed the excerpt, but what caught my eye was something a character said. The character is "Academic" and plays a historian and guide to the playwright, also a character. He is explaining the rise of the automobile factories and the effect of the car on American culture. He says, "Women became independent, they go from producers of food and clothing to consumers of food and clothing." This was meant as an earnest, praiseworthy point. I would counter with "How far we've fallen." To say that a woman (or a man) is independent because she has m...

Mystery Meat indeed!

During my grocery shopping today I was asked to pick up some hot dogs for some meal or other. Now I am not an aficianado of the 'ot dog, but will usually have a corn dog or BBQed version of one or two during the summer. If my children like them, so be it. The trouble came when trying to find a package that didn't arrive from a chemistry lab. Nitrates and nitrites, sugars (including HFCS), the preservative sodium benzoate, and other fun substances littered every package I picked up. Even Hebrew National which "Answers to a Higher Standard" was doped. Apparently Kosher doesn't mean it can't be injected with a chemical cocktail. So-called "Natural Casings" were prominently displayed to catch my eye. As if sheep or pig intestine somehow offsets Agricorps tinkering. I ended up buying the brand "sold at Tiger Stadium" not because it was chemical-free, Hell no! It was merely the brand with the least additives. Why does a hot dog need su...

I Am Not Hamlet

Search This Blog