From Shoutin’ to Social Mobility: Negotiating the Southern Self and Social Identity in Rick Bragg’s Memoirs

Abstract

Mainstream stereotypes have often depicted poor white Southerners as slow-witted simpletons or noble laborers. At the same time, affluent white Southerners have been painted as the gentry of the Lost Cause and snobbish socialites. However, the lived experience for white Southerners across the spectrum of class is far more complex. In analyzing Rick Bragg’s three family memoirs—All Over But the Shoutin’, Ava’s Man, and The Prince of Frogtown—this study examines how autobiographical narrative can serve writers seeking to negotiate a sense of self and social identity in the context of personal social mobility.

Keywords:

• Social identity
• social mobility
• memoir
• American South
• narrative analysis

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. Bragg, Rick. Interview by author. June 22, 2015.

2. Percy, Lanterns on the Levee, 192–193.

3. Weldon, “When Fantasy Meant Survival,” 91, 95.

4. Winders, “White in All the Wrong Places,” 57.

5. Newitz and Wray, White Trash, Race, and Class in America, 168.

6. Robertson, “Poor Whites in Recent Southern Fiction,” 631.

7. Wu, “Expanding Southern Whiteness,” 44.

8. Ruprecht, “The South as Tragic Landscape,” 57.

9. McPherson, Reconstructing Dixie, 5.

10. Robertson, “Poor Whites in Recent Southern Fiction,” 631.

11. Ibid., 632.

12. McKeown, “Autobiography and the Search for Identity,” 45.

13. Bidinger, The Ethics of Working Class Autobiography, 31.

14. Kraus, “The Narrative Negotiation of Identity and Belonging,” 104.

15. Hogg, Terry, and White, “A Tale of Two Theories,” 264.

16. Tajfel, Social Identity and Intergroup Relations, 2.

17. Stets and Burke, “Identity Theory and Social Identity Theory,” 224.

18. Hogg and Terry, “Social Identity and Self–Categorization Processes in Organizational Contexts,” 122.

19. Stets and Burke, “Identity Theory and Social Identity Theory,” 224.

20. Ethier and Deaux, “Negotiating Social Identity When Contexts Change,” 243.

21. Elliott, Using Narrative in Social Research, 127.

22. Bamberg, “Who Am I?,” 8–9.

23. Bragg, All Over but the Shoutin’, xx.

24. Weldon, “When Fantasy Meant Survival,” 91.

25. Bragg, All Over but the Shoutin’, 218.

26. Ibid., 227.

27. Ibid., 304.

28. Ibid., 55.

29. Ibid., 96.

30. Ibid., 103.

31. Robertson, “Poor Whites in Recent Southern Fiction,” 631.

32. Bragg, All Over but the Shoutin’, 24.

33. Bragg, Ava’s Man, 7.

34. Bragg, The Prince of Frogtown, 103.

35. Ibid., 16.

36. Robertson, “Poor Whites in Recent Southern Fiction,” 631.

37. Crews, A Childhood: The Biography of a Place, 16.

38. Bragg, All Over but the Shoutin’, xix.

39. Bragg, The Prince of Frogtown, 247.

40. Bragg, All Over but the Shoutin’, 155.

41. Bragg, Ava’s Man, 10.

42. Bragg, Ava’s Man, 57.

43. Ibid., 71.

44. Ibid., 76.

45. Bragg, The Prince of Frogtown, 11.

46. Bragg, All Over but the Shoutin’, 318.

47. Bragg, The Prince of Frogtown, 13.

48. Ibid., 251.

49. Bragg, Interview by author. June 22, 2015.

50. Bidinger, The Ethics of Working Class Autobiography, 31.

51. Bragg, Ava’s Man, 24.

52. Ethier and Deaux, “Negotiating Social Identity When Contexts Change,” 243.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Jeffrey C. Neely

Jeffrey C. Neely is an associate professor of journalism and the chair of the communication department at The University of Tampa. Much of his work focuses on the study of narrative nonfiction, including literary journalism and memoir. His textual analyses have examined the role of narrative nonfiction in war coverage, sustainability virtue ethics, hostile media theory, and gendered politics. Additionally, he has conducted both qualitative and quantitative research examining the pedagogy of teaching literary journalism and its potential for contributing to systemic educational goals.