While I agreed with much of your thinking about Appalachia, having lived there for 18 years in a small art-centered town in the Eastern Panhandle of WV. (I was in a bluegrass band, had three plays with local themes produced in two local theaters, was a market gardener with a stall in a farmer's market and manned a small mental health clinic dedicated to serving the underserved. So I have earned my right to say this, I hope.) What you do not mention is the role of backwater bias as promulgated in small Christian churches, by which I don't mean all, only too many, of them. I used to sit in on a Sunday at the Primitive Baptist church because the melodic structure and intonation of the hymns was a literal immersion in what Rumi called 'the sea of love in which the intellect drowns." I was engaged in local politics also, and at one point had a sit down over beers with a WV State Supreme Court justice who said, as a matter of fact, that the biggest problem with WV politics and culture in general was the MAGA bias of the preachers most people listened to across the state. By not taking a good hard look at that, you're doing West Virginians a major disservice.
Aaron Copeland, a Jewish, homosexual New Yorker, composed the music for the Martha Graham ballet, Appalachian Spring. Do you consider the music and ballet MAGA? Do you have any ideas on exactly how that music relates to the traditional Appalachian culture and how these two artists could somehow emulate sounds-in-time and gestures so alien to them?
Copeland said artists in the 30s and 40s were moving away from the people. What did he mean by that? I think he was a product of the left, not MAGA. How do you explain this?
I am, sorry to say, not seeing your point here. (Well, for one, I'm not a big Appalachian Spring fan. The Appalachian music I love is more the back porch picking society kind, made for the love of it by people who for the most part don't even read music.) But, how does the MAGA political thing figure in, here? And, I have no dog in the race about homosexuals. I know and love many people whose sexual orientation is not 'heteronormative.' And I love many Jewish people and am grateful to the moon and back for their many cultural contributions. So what gives, buddy? Apples and oranges?
"the biggest problem with WV politics and culture in general was the MAGA bias of the preachers most people listened to"
emphasis on "and culture"
I'm trying to understand what this means. What is your definition of MAGA? Trump supporters? White supremacists? Fascists? and where does Copeland fit in. You say you're not a big fan. Why not? He seemed pretty much inspired by "back porch picking" to me.
On your cultural scale where Rumi, a 13th century Persian, is a 10 and MAGA a 1 where is "the culture" of "back yard picking" and Copeland? And what's the difference? I am confused. Is Copeland a racist, or a snob? He said he wanted to make music more aligned with the people so how could he be a snob compared to, say, people who know who Rumi was? Right?
Well, okay, alex, or syd, or whatever your name is. I'm aware of how Copeland tried to capture Appalachian music--all those jaunty little violin applique thingies, but his music doesn't even play in the keys native to the region. As I'm a back porch picker and singer myself, I can't explain this in anything like an educated manner, but I know the sound of real Appalachian music includes much of the experience of the region, including especially the mournful aspects of a hardscrabble lifestyle. Listen to Hazel Dickens, or any number of those Scots Irish melodies which were adopted here because they play in the language of the heart. I honestly doubt if a person who's lived in NYC most of his life could get that. Not their fault, but an accident of fate. And I didn't say anything about Copeland being a racist or a snob. He's just not culturally conversant with Appalachia. (Which I still live in, BTW, though now in the Queen City of the region.) As for Rumi, if you don't understand the gist of the music, you won't understand him.
And in closing, I think MAGA is one of the most self-destructive and inside-out load of fakery ever invented. The people of WV need educational opportunities, well paying jobs, good roads, clean water and air, and if you imagine MAGA is going to give those things to them, you must have come here from another planet. Or maybe another country, one that rhymes with Fuss-ya?
Your artist commie worldview fed to your meager mind by your media feeds is the stuff of true threat to peace and prosperity. Making America Great again means purging your type from any power or influence as you are the of the ilk that is the source of everything that has gone wrong with the country.
If MAGA is not going to deliver those things, then you think Democrats are going to deliver them? Look around fool, there isn’t a single example of any Democrat run city or state, or when they have run the country, that comes close to delivering anything but more financial chaos, more corporate consolidation and graft and corruption funneling more of the nation’s assets into their pockets. Democrats are good for the top 10% and destructive to everyone else. .
I tried not to laugh out loud at this post. I sincerely hope you'll wake up (unless you're a paid influencer or a bot in which case Crickets). I am no traitor but a patriot. My ancestors fought in the war for independence, riding with both Ethan Allen and Francis the Swamp Fox Marion. They also fought in the war of 1812, and parts of Virginia were named after one of them. One from South Carolina is memorialized with a statue in the Rotunda of the Senate. My grandfather was a sailor in WWI. My uncle a fighter pilot in WWII, fighting the Nazis. My dad fought the Japanese throughout the South Pacific during WWII. My brother was wounded in Viet Nam and a cousin of mine died there. Don't you lecture me or my family about being a true American, brother. Look in the mirror instead. And despite your rudeness and lack of understanding, I wish you a Happy Thanksgiving, and more peace of mind.
So, JD Vance hates his own family, and I guess himself.
Oikophobia, an extreme and immoderate aversion to the sacred and the thwarting of the connection of the sacred to the culture of the West appears to be the underlying motif of oikophobia; and not the substitution of Hellenic Christianity by another coherent system of belief. The paradox of the oikophobe seems to be that any opposition directed at the theological and cultural tradition of the West is to be encouraged even if it is "significantly more parochial, exclusivist, patriarchal, and ethnocentric". (Mark Dooley, Roger Scruton: Philosopher on Dover Beach (Continuum 2009), p. 78.)
My bestie was the editor of the small town newspaper that ran weekly in the little town I lived in (700 residents and another 7,000 or so in the surrounding county.) He was a smart and erudite man who also wrote detective novels and music criticism. He also was an organizer of local musical events. Having grown up in an even smaller nearby place called Doe Gully, he had impeccable Appalachian creds. And he thought Hillbilly Elegy was a pile of crap. Of course it was written from the perspective of an 'ex-pat' family who weren't so much Appalachian as Ohioan working poor. I don't know what JD Vance is, but mainly I think of him as a tool of Peter Thiel and his pals from Silicon Valley. You know, the Peter Thiel who wants a tech savvy Libertarian Monarch to rule over us peons and protect us from the Antichrist, who he believes is Greta Thunberg. Who is also a self hating gay man of some reknown. But let me segue into your notions about (i have to assume) Eastern Orthodox Christianity of either a Greek or Russian origin. Which makes me speculate even more about your country of origin. I know many Russians believe that their brand of Christianity is superior to that of Eurocentric cultures. And that Vladimir Putin has positioned himself as its savior. (Sooooo ironic.) But again, I don't get how you could get there reading my posts. I believe I said I don't have a dog in that race. I mistrust any organized religion run by a patriotic cabal who want to cede all the drudge work to their women and keep all the Rolexes in the all-male club at the top. That's all. Jesus of Nazareth seems to have been a rare seer. A good friend of mine, who was once a Catholic priest, thinks Jesus was a socialist, as so many others, including those who buy into Liberation Theology. But I am not interested in hair splitting of any sort, and have arrived at my personal perspective on the sacred via forms of introspective practice not native to the West. Maybe this will smooth your ruffled feathers; maybe not. At any rate I wish you well, brother. Just don't be to free with your uninformed opinions.
Wow, the hostility of some replies to this comment does not reflect well on the interest of the MAGA crowd - who might have somehow happened to actually read this post from a pretty lefty newsletter - in the cultural and economic prospects of the author's proposed revival. I think the desire to "purge" people like the commenter, who seems to me, at least, like the sort of person who becomes the cultural bedrock of a small rural community, reflects a general hostility to any pointey-headed fancy 'edumicated' folks playing any role in the proposed revival. Too bad... I guess the revival be purely reactive, exclusionary, and hate-based rather than rooted in an actual love of a particular region and/or community, or the growth of new cultural resources and ecoomic prosperity - both those things generally require a population with good deal of both education and open-mindedness.
As to the substance of what the commenter actually suggested - that the MAGA pastors of rural evangelical congregations are part of the problem - it fell largely on deaf ears. The hateful culture of the new and anti-progressive MAGA evangelicalism will certainly not assist in any sort of positive renewal of rural American identity or prosperity, and such opposition could prove decisive.
This is very good. The revival of these rural areas should build on their cultural strengths but not let them go backward in time . The right kind of local investment might be able to make these areas grow again!
We need a national industrial policy that energizes small business in rural areas and that will lead to community development. Economics is the horse that pulls the community cart. There is no way to power the cart without economic vitality. Purpose is derived by working and being able to support a family and having some income mobility. Few people can find purpose barely surviving off government benefits.
The entire thrust of the Trump Admin's stated goal of revitalizing manufacturing is misaligned with the interest of economic growth and opportunity in rural America, IMO. That also applies to the economy in general, of course.
The share of manufacturing's contribution to GDP is shrinking for very good reasons - lower average wages in the sector domestically, and lower-wage and other imput competition from foriegn competitors in the manufacturing sector compared to the service sector being the most relevant factor. Growth, vitality, competitiveness, and leadership in the services sector are where America is getting ALL it's trade surpluses with the world and comprises the vast lion's share of overall GDP growth, not in manufacturing - which even in other industrial and industrializing nations is consistently declining as a share of GDP. Declining industries are not the wave of the future economy, but of the past.
To give rural America a stake in the economic future of our nation we should be building the infrastructure, education, training and capacity for basing the service sector more firmly in rural American communities. The idea of creating a 'renaissance' of manufacturing in our rural communities is the direct equivalent of centering agriculture as those communities' economic future - it is a pean to the past, not a door to a future of vibrant economic growth.
Ultimately, this is the reason that MAGA's prescription for economic revitalization of the American economcy is badly convceived. While I agree that there are strategic areas of manufacturing that have serious national secuirity implications (micro-electronics, aero and astronautics, robotics, explicitly defense industries, etc.) that we need to preserve and grow, I strongly disagree with the overall autarkic direction that Trump seems to be promoting with his trade and industrial 'policy' - such as it is... focusing on manufacturing of consumer goods. That is a path to continued decline and decelerating GDP growth, not to the forefront of the global economy where we need to remain.
Is "localism" really what will revitalize eastern Kentucky and areas near the Appalachian Ridge?
I liked your piece and agree that local news needs more life (everywhere - as you point out) but don't really understand how that will help this community; isn't what ails rural America largely economic not cultural?
Reading the other posts, the energy seems to be - as always - from the pervasive "MAGA vs Non-MAGA" culture wars - not anything too practical regarding job loss and the issues a young person in the region would face deciding whether to stay or leave. Government programs such as rural broadband subsidizes will help, but not solve the larger economic issues. Returning to "company towns" and coal mines won't work. Most new high-tech investments (like rare earth mining/production) won't produce the same volume of jobs that coal mines did. Perhaps for many in the region, moving somewhere else is the best option. That's what JD Vance did.
This was very interesting, thanks. Do you have any ideas of a more "legitimatly Appalachian" novel to compare Hillbilly Elegy to? I think it could be a fun book club topic
You don't talk about agriculture. In rural areas family farms were once a major part of the local economy and social fabric Today, small farms can't survive. And small regenerative or organic farms, although desired by consumers, can't compete with cheap industrial farmed food. But onerous regulations play a role also.
A real program to save rural America would help small farmers, especially small organic and regenerative farmers. It would also help small locally owned and businesses, and limit the big box and national chains - or tax them more. These type of radical policies by democrats might actually win new voters.
I am sceptical that democrats would enact such policies because in the states they have run they have never done so and there is just as much rural blight in upstate New York as there is in rural Tennessee ( maybe more). But if democrat politicians would defy big Ag and big chemical and get serious about helping farmers grow healthy food on a human scale, they could win disaffected dems like me over.
I would think the schools would be a top priority. They should teach kids not to hate their own people, i.e., whites. Next, there should be no race and sex quotas anywhere. For example, no Title IX. No DEI. Ideally, traditional Christianity should be enculcated as an antidote to the dominant sacred-victim, entitled parasite culture. Good luck.
While I agreed with much of your thinking about Appalachia, having lived there for 18 years in a small art-centered town in the Eastern Panhandle of WV. (I was in a bluegrass band, had three plays with local themes produced in two local theaters, was a market gardener with a stall in a farmer's market and manned a small mental health clinic dedicated to serving the underserved. So I have earned my right to say this, I hope.) What you do not mention is the role of backwater bias as promulgated in small Christian churches, by which I don't mean all, only too many, of them. I used to sit in on a Sunday at the Primitive Baptist church because the melodic structure and intonation of the hymns was a literal immersion in what Rumi called 'the sea of love in which the intellect drowns." I was engaged in local politics also, and at one point had a sit down over beers with a WV State Supreme Court justice who said, as a matter of fact, that the biggest problem with WV politics and culture in general was the MAGA bias of the preachers most people listened to across the state. By not taking a good hard look at that, you're doing West Virginians a major disservice.
Aaron Copeland, a Jewish, homosexual New Yorker, composed the music for the Martha Graham ballet, Appalachian Spring. Do you consider the music and ballet MAGA? Do you have any ideas on exactly how that music relates to the traditional Appalachian culture and how these two artists could somehow emulate sounds-in-time and gestures so alien to them?
Copeland said artists in the 30s and 40s were moving away from the people. What did he mean by that? I think he was a product of the left, not MAGA. How do you explain this?
I am, sorry to say, not seeing your point here. (Well, for one, I'm not a big Appalachian Spring fan. The Appalachian music I love is more the back porch picking society kind, made for the love of it by people who for the most part don't even read music.) But, how does the MAGA political thing figure in, here? And, I have no dog in the race about homosexuals. I know and love many people whose sexual orientation is not 'heteronormative.' And I love many Jewish people and am grateful to the moon and back for their many cultural contributions. So what gives, buddy? Apples and oranges?
"the biggest problem with WV politics and culture in general was the MAGA bias of the preachers most people listened to"
emphasis on "and culture"
I'm trying to understand what this means. What is your definition of MAGA? Trump supporters? White supremacists? Fascists? and where does Copeland fit in. You say you're not a big fan. Why not? He seemed pretty much inspired by "back porch picking" to me.
On your cultural scale where Rumi, a 13th century Persian, is a 10 and MAGA a 1 where is "the culture" of "back yard picking" and Copeland? And what's the difference? I am confused. Is Copeland a racist, or a snob? He said he wanted to make music more aligned with the people so how could he be a snob compared to, say, people who know who Rumi was? Right?
Well, okay, alex, or syd, or whatever your name is. I'm aware of how Copeland tried to capture Appalachian music--all those jaunty little violin applique thingies, but his music doesn't even play in the keys native to the region. As I'm a back porch picker and singer myself, I can't explain this in anything like an educated manner, but I know the sound of real Appalachian music includes much of the experience of the region, including especially the mournful aspects of a hardscrabble lifestyle. Listen to Hazel Dickens, or any number of those Scots Irish melodies which were adopted here because they play in the language of the heart. I honestly doubt if a person who's lived in NYC most of his life could get that. Not their fault, but an accident of fate. And I didn't say anything about Copeland being a racist or a snob. He's just not culturally conversant with Appalachia. (Which I still live in, BTW, though now in the Queen City of the region.) As for Rumi, if you don't understand the gist of the music, you won't understand him.
And in closing, I think MAGA is one of the most self-destructive and inside-out load of fakery ever invented. The people of WV need educational opportunities, well paying jobs, good roads, clean water and air, and if you imagine MAGA is going to give those things to them, you must have come here from another planet. Or maybe another country, one that rhymes with Fuss-ya?
Your artist commie worldview fed to your meager mind by your media feeds is the stuff of true threat to peace and prosperity. Making America Great again means purging your type from any power or influence as you are the of the ilk that is the source of everything that has gone wrong with the country.
If MAGA is not going to deliver those things, then you think Democrats are going to deliver them? Look around fool, there isn’t a single example of any Democrat run city or state, or when they have run the country, that comes close to delivering anything but more financial chaos, more corporate consolidation and graft and corruption funneling more of the nation’s assets into their pockets. Democrats are good for the top 10% and destructive to everyone else. .
I tried not to laugh out loud at this post. I sincerely hope you'll wake up (unless you're a paid influencer or a bot in which case Crickets). I am no traitor but a patriot. My ancestors fought in the war for independence, riding with both Ethan Allen and Francis the Swamp Fox Marion. They also fought in the war of 1812, and parts of Virginia were named after one of them. One from South Carolina is memorialized with a statue in the Rotunda of the Senate. My grandfather was a sailor in WWI. My uncle a fighter pilot in WWII, fighting the Nazis. My dad fought the Japanese throughout the South Pacific during WWII. My brother was wounded in Viet Nam and a cousin of mine died there. Don't you lecture me or my family about being a true American, brother. Look in the mirror instead. And despite your rudeness and lack of understanding, I wish you a Happy Thanksgiving, and more peace of mind.
So, JD Vance hates his own family, and I guess himself.
Oikophobia, an extreme and immoderate aversion to the sacred and the thwarting of the connection of the sacred to the culture of the West appears to be the underlying motif of oikophobia; and not the substitution of Hellenic Christianity by another coherent system of belief. The paradox of the oikophobe seems to be that any opposition directed at the theological and cultural tradition of the West is to be encouraged even if it is "significantly more parochial, exclusivist, patriarchal, and ethnocentric". (Mark Dooley, Roger Scruton: Philosopher on Dover Beach (Continuum 2009), p. 78.)
My bestie was the editor of the small town newspaper that ran weekly in the little town I lived in (700 residents and another 7,000 or so in the surrounding county.) He was a smart and erudite man who also wrote detective novels and music criticism. He also was an organizer of local musical events. Having grown up in an even smaller nearby place called Doe Gully, he had impeccable Appalachian creds. And he thought Hillbilly Elegy was a pile of crap. Of course it was written from the perspective of an 'ex-pat' family who weren't so much Appalachian as Ohioan working poor. I don't know what JD Vance is, but mainly I think of him as a tool of Peter Thiel and his pals from Silicon Valley. You know, the Peter Thiel who wants a tech savvy Libertarian Monarch to rule over us peons and protect us from the Antichrist, who he believes is Greta Thunberg. Who is also a self hating gay man of some reknown. But let me segue into your notions about (i have to assume) Eastern Orthodox Christianity of either a Greek or Russian origin. Which makes me speculate even more about your country of origin. I know many Russians believe that their brand of Christianity is superior to that of Eurocentric cultures. And that Vladimir Putin has positioned himself as its savior. (Sooooo ironic.) But again, I don't get how you could get there reading my posts. I believe I said I don't have a dog in that race. I mistrust any organized religion run by a patriotic cabal who want to cede all the drudge work to their women and keep all the Rolexes in the all-male club at the top. That's all. Jesus of Nazareth seems to have been a rare seer. A good friend of mine, who was once a Catholic priest, thinks Jesus was a socialist, as so many others, including those who buy into Liberation Theology. But I am not interested in hair splitting of any sort, and have arrived at my personal perspective on the sacred via forms of introspective practice not native to the West. Maybe this will smooth your ruffled feathers; maybe not. At any rate I wish you well, brother. Just don't be to free with your uninformed opinions.
Wow, the hostility of some replies to this comment does not reflect well on the interest of the MAGA crowd - who might have somehow happened to actually read this post from a pretty lefty newsletter - in the cultural and economic prospects of the author's proposed revival. I think the desire to "purge" people like the commenter, who seems to me, at least, like the sort of person who becomes the cultural bedrock of a small rural community, reflects a general hostility to any pointey-headed fancy 'edumicated' folks playing any role in the proposed revival. Too bad... I guess the revival be purely reactive, exclusionary, and hate-based rather than rooted in an actual love of a particular region and/or community, or the growth of new cultural resources and ecoomic prosperity - both those things generally require a population with good deal of both education and open-mindedness.
As to the substance of what the commenter actually suggested - that the MAGA pastors of rural evangelical congregations are part of the problem - it fell largely on deaf ears. The hateful culture of the new and anti-progressive MAGA evangelicalism will certainly not assist in any sort of positive renewal of rural American identity or prosperity, and such opposition could prove decisive.
This is very good. The revival of these rural areas should build on their cultural strengths but not let them go backward in time . The right kind of local investment might be able to make these areas grow again!
We need a national industrial policy that energizes small business in rural areas and that will lead to community development. Economics is the horse that pulls the community cart. There is no way to power the cart without economic vitality. Purpose is derived by working and being able to support a family and having some income mobility. Few people can find purpose barely surviving off government benefits.
very well put.
The entire thrust of the Trump Admin's stated goal of revitalizing manufacturing is misaligned with the interest of economic growth and opportunity in rural America, IMO. That also applies to the economy in general, of course.
The share of manufacturing's contribution to GDP is shrinking for very good reasons - lower average wages in the sector domestically, and lower-wage and other imput competition from foriegn competitors in the manufacturing sector compared to the service sector being the most relevant factor. Growth, vitality, competitiveness, and leadership in the services sector are where America is getting ALL it's trade surpluses with the world and comprises the vast lion's share of overall GDP growth, not in manufacturing - which even in other industrial and industrializing nations is consistently declining as a share of GDP. Declining industries are not the wave of the future economy, but of the past.
To give rural America a stake in the economic future of our nation we should be building the infrastructure, education, training and capacity for basing the service sector more firmly in rural American communities. The idea of creating a 'renaissance' of manufacturing in our rural communities is the direct equivalent of centering agriculture as those communities' economic future - it is a pean to the past, not a door to a future of vibrant economic growth.
Ultimately, this is the reason that MAGA's prescription for economic revitalization of the American economcy is badly convceived. While I agree that there are strategic areas of manufacturing that have serious national secuirity implications (micro-electronics, aero and astronautics, robotics, explicitly defense industries, etc.) that we need to preserve and grow, I strongly disagree with the overall autarkic direction that Trump seems to be promoting with his trade and industrial 'policy' - such as it is... focusing on manufacturing of consumer goods. That is a path to continued decline and decelerating GDP growth, not to the forefront of the global economy where we need to remain.
Is "localism" really what will revitalize eastern Kentucky and areas near the Appalachian Ridge?
I liked your piece and agree that local news needs more life (everywhere - as you point out) but don't really understand how that will help this community; isn't what ails rural America largely economic not cultural?
Reading the other posts, the energy seems to be - as always - from the pervasive "MAGA vs Non-MAGA" culture wars - not anything too practical regarding job loss and the issues a young person in the region would face deciding whether to stay or leave. Government programs such as rural broadband subsidizes will help, but not solve the larger economic issues. Returning to "company towns" and coal mines won't work. Most new high-tech investments (like rare earth mining/production) won't produce the same volume of jobs that coal mines did. Perhaps for many in the region, moving somewhere else is the best option. That's what JD Vance did.
This was very interesting, thanks. Do you have any ideas of a more "legitimatly Appalachian" novel to compare Hillbilly Elegy to? I think it could be a fun book club topic
You don't talk about agriculture. In rural areas family farms were once a major part of the local economy and social fabric Today, small farms can't survive. And small regenerative or organic farms, although desired by consumers, can't compete with cheap industrial farmed food. But onerous regulations play a role also.
A real program to save rural America would help small farmers, especially small organic and regenerative farmers. It would also help small locally owned and businesses, and limit the big box and national chains - or tax them more. These type of radical policies by democrats might actually win new voters.
I am sceptical that democrats would enact such policies because in the states they have run they have never done so and there is just as much rural blight in upstate New York as there is in rural Tennessee ( maybe more). But if democrat politicians would defy big Ag and big chemical and get serious about helping farmers grow healthy food on a human scale, they could win disaffected dems like me over.
I would think the schools would be a top priority. They should teach kids not to hate their own people, i.e., whites. Next, there should be no race and sex quotas anywhere. For example, no Title IX. No DEI. Ideally, traditional Christianity should be enculcated as an antidote to the dominant sacred-victim, entitled parasite culture. Good luck.