Abstract

Literary and cultural texts by southern poor whites in the hills of the Ozarksand Appalachia and southern migrants in Rustbelt Ohio explode with feelings such ashatred, desperation, and anger, resulting from the continual precaritization andmarginalization of the mountain communities. In (auto)biographical texts as well as inliterary fiction, the ?hillbilly? community is represented as self-segregated, proud,and independent, with special notions of honor and loyalty. Exploring the(dis)connections between the literary emotions of the people of the Mountain South andthe code of southern honor that has produced and sustained them, this article arguesthat the anxious and angry emotions that Donald Trump taps into as a political strategyare not new, but rather have been building throughout the 20th and into the 21stcenturies. The first manifestations that this precarious affective structure was formingcan be seen in this regional literature, illustrating the potential in explorations ofliterary ugly feelings (Ngai, 2005) of marginalized southerners. Thus, the articleuncovers how poor whites position their precarious existences in Trump?s USA and howthey employ various affective strategies to articulate their whiteness and theiranxiety.

Highlights

  • Literary and cultural texts by southern poor whites in the hills of the Ozarks and Appalachia and southern migrants in Rustbelt Ohio explode with feelings such as hatred, desperation, and anger, resulting from the continual precaritization and marginalization of the mountain communities

  • Spite and violence are central to the genre, and these affects and themes permeate the texts on all narrative levels

  • The political qualities of these Mountain South texts are further complicated by cultural mores and a particular historical context, especially as these relate to race and gender

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Summary

Introduction

Literary and cultural texts by southern poor whites in the hills of the Ozarks and Appalachia and southern migrants in Rustbelt Ohio explode with feelings such as hatred, desperation, and anger, resulting from the continual precaritization and marginalization of the mountain communities. Within a southern literary and cultural context, honor becomes a catalyst for various shared and communally felt emotions – affects – that form the crux of the problem of poor, white southern mountain folks’ sense of precarity and anxiety.

Results
Conclusion

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