![]() | The Brown Decision, Jim Crow, and Southern Identity Subjects: Brown Oliver 1918– -- Trials litigation etc.; Topeka (Kan.). Board of Education -- Trials litigation etc.; Segregation in education -- Law and legislation -- United States; Race discrimination -- Law and legislation -- United States; African America; The 1954 Brown v. Board of Education ruling was a watershed event in the fight against racial segregation in the United States. The recent fiftieth anniversary of Brown prompted a surge of tributes: books, television and radio specials, conferences, and speeches. At the same time, says James C. Cobb, it revealed a growing trend of dismissiveness and negativity toward Brown and other accomplishments of the civil rights movement. Writing as both a lauded historian and a white southerner from the last generation to grow up under southern apartheid, Cobb responds to what he sees as distortions of Brown 's legacy and their implied disservice to those whom it inspired and empowered. JAMES C. COBB is the B. Phinizy Spalding Distinguished Professor of History at the University of Georgia. His numerous publications include Redefining Southern Culture and The Brown Decision, Jim Crow, and Southern Identity (both Georgia), Away Down South , The Selling of the South: The Southern Crusade for Industrial Development, 1936-1990 and The Most Southern Place on Earth: The Mississippi Delta and the Roots of Regional Identity . |
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