The New York Times bestseller A New York Times Notable and Critics’ Top Book of 2016Longlisted for the PEN/John Kenneth Galbraith Award for NonfictionOne of NPR’s 10 Best Books Of 2016 Faced Tough Topics Head OnNPR’s Book Concierge Guide To 2016’s Great ReadsSan Francisco Chronicle’s Best of 2016: 100 recommended booksA Washington Post Notable Nonfiction Book of 2016Globe & Mail 100 Best of … Nonfiction Book of 2016
Globe & Mail 100 Best of 2016
“Formidable and truth-dealing . . . necessary.” —The New York Times
“This eye-opening investigation into our country’s entrenched social hierarchy is acutely relevant.” —O Magazine
In her groundbreaking bestselling history of the class system in America, Nancy Isenberg upends history as we know it by taking on our comforting myths about equality and uncovering the crucial legacy of the ever-present, always embarrassing—if occasionally entertaining—poor white trash.
“When you turn an election into a three-ring circus, there’s always a chance that the dancing bear will win,” says Isenberg of the political climate surrounding Sarah Palin. And we recognize how right she is today. Yet the voters who boosted Trump all the way to the White House have been a permanent part of our American fabric, argues Isenberg.
The wretched and landless poor have existed from the time of the earliest British colonial settlement to today’s hillbillies. 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.
Surveying political rhetoric and policy, popular literature and scientific theories over four hundred years, Isenberg upends assumptions about America’s supposedly class-free society––where liberty and hard work were meant to ensure real social mobility. Poor whites were central to the rise of the Republican Party in the early nineteenth century, and the Civil War itself was fought over class issues nearly as much as it was fought over slavery. Reconstruction pitted poor white trash against newly freed slaves, which factored in the rise of eugenics–-a widely popular movement embraced by Theodore Roosevelt that targeted poor whites for sterilization. These poor were at the heart of New Deal reforms and LBJ’s Great Society; they haunt us in reality TV shows like Here Comes Honey Boo Boo and Duck Dynasty. Marginalized as a class, white trash have always been at or near the center of major political debates over the character of the American identity.
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.
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A very important book about the poor and underclass in America. It is being used in a number of colleges as a text
This book provides a sobering and fresh look at class-ism in the US.
This is a fascinating book! I learned so many new details about history. I read it on my Nook the first time around, but I want to purchase it in paper so I can take notes and study the history that coincides with the book.
This is a very detailed look at extremes parading itself as Everyman. Lots of interesting detail presented in a tedious manner.
This is a well researched book that illuminates the social and political situation currently in the USA. I learned so much about the load of bias and prejudice I carry and it’s origin. If more of us read this book we might really become that mythical “land of opportunity” to which we aspire.
A totally different view of American history, settlers and founding fathers than will ever be taught in school.
Well researched, but may have biased conclusions of author.
Too much like someone’s doctoral dissertation.
What you need to know…
This was a fascinating study of how people who were considered almost sub-human came to North America and evolved into what is now considered white trailer trash. Yet those people, particularly in the southern states, felt that at least they were socially above slaves, and the slaveholding elites prevented them from owning land or having any standing in the communities. After the Civil War and the end of slavery, they continued to have no value, living in trailer parks and considered even today as shiftless. Very well written and highly recommended.
I was born in South America where class distinction is strong in areas. This book helped see more keenly that class distinction also is part many other cultures.
Made me think of historical events like the civil war from a different perspective and think deeper about class structures in our country. Good stuff
Good book.
Listening on audible. It’s interesting to learn more about the poor white in america that everyone pretends they don’t see. And the white bonded “slaves” that were sent here to work off debts or crimes that helped build this country. Many of their families have basically never left that station in life. We are all the same. People need to realize there has always been injustice to the poor. No matter what color, or religion. Poor is poor, and it hurts.
In White Trash, Nancy Isenberg reveals a dark and tangled American secret at the core of our history: the pervasive persistence of white poverty. She deftly explores the interplay of mockery and denial in treatments, historical and fictional, of hardships and limits in a supposed land of equal and abundant opportunity. Drawing upon popular media as well as historical sources, from past and present, she exposes harsh realities long kept hidden in plain sight.
From John Locke’s plans for the colonies to twentieth-century eugenics, from the rise of Andrew Jackson to the modern Republican party, White Trash will change the way we think about our past and present.
The style was a bit scholarly for my taste, but it was informative and thought provoking. Definitely worth the time to read.
Non fiction history of American class structure focusing on the white underclass and myths of social mobility.
Real eye opener. You got some of this in Zinn’s History of America but not to this extent or detail. Amusing in parts as well disturbing. Covers much information and territory. I think a lot of us ignorant or in denial of the class society we still live in and support.
I grew up in Appalachia, moved away to the city for college, visit rarely. This history did a good job of explaining a subculture within America, a history of choices made FOR groups of people, and how social policy and government “ideas” have influenced America’s distribution of wealth since before there WAS an America.