Posted: the campaign sign landscape, race, and political participation in Mississippi

Abstract

Cultural landscapes offer potential insights into cultural processes. As a cultural/political landscape element, the domestic campaign sign is linked to a variety of socio-cultural and political processes. Examination of the geographical distribution of 2004 presidential election campaign signs posted throughout the town of Hattiesburg, Mississippi, illustrates that race is a factor in understanding who chooses to post signs. Historically, limitations on political participation in the South would have included use of landscape for communication, imposing a sort of metacommunicative landscape hegemony. Further, patterns of sign postings and voter turnout indicate that both activities are forms of political participation that are embraced differently by different social groups.

Keywords:

• cultural landscape
• campaign sign
• race
• political participation
• Mississippi

Notes

1. This study addresses participation in a national level election only. Field observations indicate that a similar study focusing on participation in local politics and elections may yield a different result. Though no data were collected, in African-American neighborhoods sign postings for local elections appeared in greater numbers than for the national election.

2. Though census tracts and voting precincts often closely resemble each other, they are distinct. This is a common problem in electoral geography and, though methods exist to overcome this problem (see Archer et al. 1986, p. 21), for this study, visual comparisons should suffice, as maps are rendered with both datasets.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

J.O. Joby Bass

J.O. Joby Bass is Associate Professor at the Department of Geography and Geology, The University of Southern Mississippi, Hattiesburg, Mississippi, USA