Review: White Trash

Title: White Trash: The 400 year untold history of class in America

Author: Nancy Isenburg

Date Completed: 8 August 2016

“Waste people,” “offals,” “rubbish,” “lazy lubbers,” "crackers," or just plain ol' "white trash." --Isenburg surveyed political rhetoric, popular literature, newspapers, public policies, scientific theories, and much more from colonial days to the present about the underclass of (white) American society. From Great Britain sending their lubbers to the colonies to the founding generations ranking humans like animal breeds and from American eugenic policies to Here Comes Honey Boo Boo, she covers a lot of ground in the 15 hour audiobook.

Having read DeForest's personal account of how he classified different groups of people of both races in Greenville post-Civil War in A Union Officer in the Reconstruction a few years ago, it was fascinating to learn how the various strata of society were viewed and discussed in a wider range of places and time periods. I felt DeForest's book did much to explain the current relations and tensions in the modern South, and feel that Isenburg elaboration on the subject helps me view American history through another lens beyond just the "great men."

(P.S. Isenburg does touch on the intersectional issues of racial injustice for a variety of groups in American history, but her primary focus is on the underclass of white folk.)