history – Snake & Tree

Populism

Good country folk historically hate big business, cops, authority of any kind, and rich folks. What happened? Nothing, really.

April 28, 2018April 28, 2018

Review: Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America by Barbara Ehrenreich

Poverty is a state of emergency.

Review: William Gay’s Little Sister Death

William Gay could tell a story. Even a scary one. Especially a scary one.

February 3, 2018February 3, 2018

Guilt, Shame & the Southern Imaginary

We can feel guilt or shame about our ancestors. Or we can drink a lot and get to work.

January 25, 2018

The Possum and the First Lady

George Jones and Tammy Wynette were both legacies. I think she got the short shrift.

January 18, 2018

Review: Steven Stoll’s Ramp Hollow: The Ordeal of Appalachia

Stoll’s book of Appalachian history was released in November of last year. The responses are wild, so here’s mine.

January 9, 2018January 9, 2018

American Farm Bureau Speech

Thoughts after Trump’s American Farm Bureau Conference speech. Short and sweet? It was lame.

January 6, 2018January 6, 2018

No Pleasure but Meanness: The Untold History of the Kingpin of Organized Crime in Alabama

Willie Dewitt Dawson drove a black Lincoln Continental with “kingpin” on the front license plate. Don’t piss off the boys from Alabama.

December 16, 2017December 16, 2017

My Buddy Bill: Y’all Need Faulkner

Faulkner scares people. With as much truth as he’s dropping, he probably should.

September 19, 2017

Review: Nancy Isenberg’s White Trash

Nancy Isenberg’s history of poor white Southerners, aka “white trash,” is both necessary and exceedingly good.

I’m Rachel, a jaded twenty-something English grad student looking to tell some stories. Currently based in Knoxville, Tennessee, born and bred in rural Alabama. Here you’ll find liberal political tirades, stories, book reviews, and folklore focused in on these lower Southeastern thirteen states.

The title “Snake and Tree” comes from the Alabama proverb that if you hang a dead snake in a tree it’ll bring rain. These stories are the snake. The rain is making peace with this broke South.