The New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture, Volume 11: Agriculture and Industry (review)

The Center for the Study of Southern Culture at the University of Mississippi is sponsoring the publication of The New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture, a revision of the 1989 encyclopedia. Originally published as a single volume, the Encyclopedia attempted to synthesize much of the exciting work of the 1980s in history, sociology, and other disciplines examining culture in the American South. The New Encyclopedia is being published as twenty-four separate paperback volumes that will hopefully reflect the innovative approaches to the study of southern culture over the last two decades. It also attempts to be more comprehensive than the 1989 volume and include more analysis of colonial and antebellum periods.

Volume 11: Agriculture and Industry explores the relationship between the economic and the cultural life of the South. The book is divided into two parts, "Agriculture" and "Industry," that both begin with roughly ten-thousand-word essays followed by one-thousand-word thematic essays (twenty-five on agriculture and thirteen on industry) as well as seventy-one small entries on individual crops, industries, companies, and influential individuals. The emphasis on longer essays as opposed to shorter entries that cover more numerous topics affords the authors more space for analysis. This is particularly well-suited to capturing recent scholarship.

"Agriculture," edited by Melissa Walker, truly rests on the most recent scholarship on southern farms, plantations, slavery, and rural life. Walker's impressive essay succinctly moves from colonial and antebellum planters, yeomen, and slaves to postwar tenancy, boll weevils, and government programs before concluding with the rise of agribusiness in recent decades. The thematic essays rely heavily on the scholarship of Joyce Chaplin, Peter Coclanis, Pete Daniel, Deborah Fitzgerald, Lu Ann Jones, Jack Temple Kirby, Connie Lester, Stephanie McCurry, Ted Ownby, Melissa Walker, and Jeannie Whayne, all published within the last twenty years. The essays and entries incorporate race and gender, the dynamics of market capitalism, the environment, and the diversity of southerners.

"Industry," edited by James C. Cobb, is not so lively. This section focuses more on economic development than on industry as a multifaceted topic. Most essays and entries reference the scholarship of the 1980s, although some cite more recent works on globalization and the southern economy like David Carlton and Peter Coclanis's The South, the Nation, and the World. Contributors just as frequently frame their essays and entries with Gavin Wright's 1986 economic history Old South, New South. Furthermore, there is considerable discussion of the lack of economic development in the region, but more attention could have been paid to industries that did exist. While there is a photograph of a steel mill in Birmingham, Alabama, there is little discussion of the mills or mines that surrounded the "Pittsburgh of the South." There also could have been more discussion of the salt, turpentine, shipping, tourism, chemical, and meatpacking industries. This section also tends to ignore the dazzling labor histories of the South published in the last twenty years that explore the intersections of capital, technology, workers, class, race, civil rights, unionism, and culture. Perhaps the forthcoming volume on social class will cover these topics.

Readers interested in Appalachia will find a handful of direct references to the region in the New Encyclopedia. The Mountain South makes appearances in discussions of coal, migration, oil, and part-time farming, as well as in an essay on the industrialization of Appalachia. Many other entries, especially those about rural life, are relevant to Appalachia as well. Finally, researchers of southern culture will find this volume a useful starting point, especially for agricultural topics.