Appalachian and Southern Religion

Like many other cities, Knoxville, Tennessee, in the years following World War Two, suffered the mass exodus of population from the inner-city neighborhoods to the sprawling suburbs.  The flight of people to the mall-frenzied, fast food dominated suburbs ruined the small, family run businesses and beautiful city neighborhoods, which were mainstays in the inner-city for decades.  One Knoxville inner-city neighborhood that suffered centers around Magnolia Avenue in East Knoxville.  Once the centerpiece of a growing Appalachian city, the broad Magnolia Avenue boulevard was the premier entrance from the east.  Today that wide thoroughfare is a decaying inner-city highway that cries out with past glory.  This is the study of the historical evolution of Magnolia Avenue from its heyday in the 1950s and 1960s to its present-day blue-collar commercial development.  In reconstructing the history of Magnolia's residential and commercial development, patterns emerge that indicate when changes started and why they occurred.  Today Magnolia Avenue is home to a various array of fast food restaurants, social service centers, health care professionals, churches, commercial establishments, along with a few lavish old houses---remnants of the street's past splendor.

Shape-note traditions are both a style and practice of rural hymnody that contribute to the varied canon of American folk hymnody. The history of shape-note traditions in the United States highlights the polarity between the early four and seven-shape traditions and the ensuing seven-shape gospel movement, defining the former as traditional and the latter as popular and modern. The designation of gospel music as a popular phenomenon resulted in a variety of responses that shaped the representation of the genre within Appalachia. This thesis is an exploration of seven-shape gospel music and its persistence within rural, independent Baptist churches in Watauga County, North Carolina. I began exploring seven-shape gospel music under the assumption that I was dealing with an obscure singing tradition unique to a small number of rural churches. Therefore, I focused my attention on Mount Lebanon and Mountain Dale Baptist Churches, whose singing practices have been and continue to be defined by seven-shape gospel music. In January 2009, I began observing and researching the singing traditions of these two churches, attending Sunday morning, Sunday evening, and Wednesday evening services, having selected these specific congregations for their different interpretations of a shared shape-note heritage. In addition to participant observation, I also conducted interviews with several members of each congregation, focusing in particular on the two choir directors. Over the course of my research, patterns in worship order and style emerged that indicated an intrinsic connection between the rural, independent Baptist church and the seven-shape gospel tradition. My ongoing interviews corroborated that Mount Lebanon and Mountain Dale Churches were not sole remnants of a dying, seven-shape gospel tradition, but rather two examples of an enduring regional practice that persists within the independent Baptist churches in the tri-state area of western North Carolina, eastern Tennessee, and southwest Virginia. As I delved deeper into the history and roots of seven-shape gospel music in Watauga County, I uncovered an entrenched regional singing tradition characterized by monthly and annual singing conventions, indicating a popularity that confounded my initial perception of the movement as an isolated, rural phenomenon. My case study of two rural churches has therefore necessarily shifted to accommodate the vibrant history of rural hymnody in the United States and its controversial representation and preservation in Appalachia, raising important questions about the limitations of regional scholarship that has heretofore discounted the seven-shape gospel tradition as a trait of indigenous worship.

Intense media coverage of Appalachian Pentecostal-Holiness serpent handling sometimes causes a switch in signifier/signified relationships. The snakes used symbolically in this practice are grounded less in traditional religious meaning, and more in a certain recent secular meaning: from signifying faith in the Holy Spirit to indicating the value of celebrity status. This phenomenon is analyzed in a framework of theories about symbols and rituals, and is then described in a series of ethnographic observations at a serpent-handling church in Kentucky. This case study raises some troubling issues about how cosmopolitan media represent a distinctive local culture.

This project aims to help answer the question of "How did Christians in the Antebellum South support such an institution as chattel slavery?" To do so it offers a survey of the scriptural, moral, economical, and theological defenses of the system used by Christians in the Antebellum South. It also gives attention to the role clergy played in promoting slavery. It relies heavily on secondary sources, but also incorporates significant primary sources from the time period. This project hopes to provide in one place a concise survey of the defenses for slavery used by Southern Antebellum Christians. This research reveals not only "how" Christians defended the institution of slavery, but also that they believed by doing so they were being obedient to God.

Ever wonder what it would be like to hike 2,174 miles from Georgia to Maine along the world’s longest continuously marked footpath? Join “Marathon” as he provides a humorous autobiographical account of a “real” walk in the woods. Anyone who enjoys travel or adventure will love Marathon’s story. This book is required reading for any outdoor enthusiast and will certainly assist anyone wanting to plan an Appalachian Trail (AT) section or thru-hike. Live vicariously through this entertaining account, which includes over 350 accompanying pictures. This book is the culmination of 34 articles that were written for the author’s hometown newspaper as he thru-hiked the entire AT. All articles were written while still on the trail. Appendices also include the author’s daily mileage and location log, his thru-hike equipment list, a suggested AT readings list, and a comprehensive collection of reflective thoughts and suggestions by another AT thru-hiker, “Bonespur.”

One question facing the makers of documentary films is 'How can I make it marketable'? This paper address that question with reference to three films dating from the late twentieth century that set out to document aspects of American folklore:: 'Being a Joines', by Tom Davenport, documenting the life of a North Carolina raconteur; ''J'ai été au bal', by Les Blank, a celebration of the Cajun musical culture of southern Louisiana; and 'Road Scholar', by Andrei Codrescu, a portrait of America as a land of irrepressible and sometimes zany individuality. While honoring people and scenes that are off the beaten track, each film offers a implied critique of the conventionality of mainstream culture.

Context for "In the Footsteps of Mother Jones, Mothers of the Miners" (2010) and my 2001 book Women, Music and Faith in Central Appalachia. Originally published as “Heath Adam Ackley” as part of “Reflections on the Concept of Place in the Study of Women of the Mountain South: A Roundtable Discussion with the Authors” in Women of the Mountain South: Identity, Work and Activism, Series in Race, Ethnicity and Gender in Appalachia, ed. Connie Park Rice and Marie Tedesco (Athens OH: Ohio University Press, March 2015): 488.

Chapter 5 from Women, Music and Faith in Central Appalachia, the constructive theological response from a process feminist perspective to theodicy in Central Appalachian and urban Appalachian women's theographia (songs, art, artifacts, journals, letters). Originally published under my then married compound name (pre-transition), Heather Ann Ackley Bean.

From guest editor Mark I. West's Introduction: "Tina L. Hanlon’s article “Struggles for Life, Liberty, and Land: Appalachian Mining Communities in Children’s Literature” focuses on children’s and young adult books that are set in Appalachia from the early twentieth century to the present. They deal with conflicts between mountain communities and the coal industry, which provides jobs that often cause injury, death, economic hardship, and pollution. The young protagonists in these books have a deep identification with the land where they live. For many of these characters, when the land is despoiled by the coal companies, they feel as if they, too, have suffered a loss. For the most part, however, these young characters do not seem like the lost children that Eckard discusses in her article. Hanlon argues that for these child characters, their sense of belonging to a community, even if it is a community that is under duress, provides them with a sense of identity and purpose." Some illustrations are included.

In its alliance with the Appalachian church, the coal industry has brought the region to its knees. The church in Appalachia has advocated for the coal industry by manipulating papal documents and historically pressuring Appalachians to sell their land. In turn, the church has abandoned its mission of environmental stewardship and uplifting the poor by framing theologically sound arguments with incomplete data regarding jobs. As a result, a machine that perpetuates poverty and ecological destruction remains. The means of rescuing Appalachia and its church lies in liberation theology and its emphasis on contemplative action that adapts the theological framework to numerous communities. Through the examination of historical church activity, papal decrees, theological work done by the Catholic Committee of Appalachia and Michael Iafrate, along with jobs and economic data from the Appalachian Regional Commission, BW Research, and the Energy Futures Initiative, liberation theologians can begin to make out the first shadows of Appalachian liberation theology. Such a theology involves the exaltation of local churches and the championing of migrating jobs in green energy and technology to the region to replace the coal industry.

Presented March 13, 2021 at the John Hoaglund Conference in Philosophy and Religion

Many Mountains, Much News
Digitizing Appalachia’s Historic Newspapers
Appalachian Studies Association Conference 2015

For centuries, newspapers in Appalachia were a vitally important source for reporting local and state news.  Their pages circulated through the many mountains of Virginia, West Virginia, Tennessee and Kentucky, carrying the first reports from the massacre at Matewan, through the Civil War and the fight for the 19th amendment to the US Constitution.  Now the pages and papers coveted by the great-great-great-grandparents of today’s Appalachians can be read once again through the Library of Congress website and their newspaper portal: Chronicling America.  Three universities, West Virginia University, The University of Tennessee, and the University of Kentucky, and the Library of Virginia, are digitizing Appalachia’s historic newspapers from the late eighteen century through the early years of the twentieth century as recipients of a National Endowment for the Humanities grant.

This session will discuss various aspects of the digitization process and highlight actual newspaper stories now available on the Chronicling America website.

In her groundbreaking book "Appalachian Mountain Religion," Deborah Vansau McCauley leveled an important critique against emerging articulations of “Appalachian liberation theology.”  Protestant and Roman Catholic churches and movements working for “social justice” which were influenced in some way by Latin American liberation theology, she said, were simply new forms of an old religious colonialism in Appalachia. McCauley based this important critique in large part on the 1992 pastoral letter of the United Methodist Bishops, "God’s Face is Turned Toward the Mountains," but applied this argument too against the Roman Catholic bishops’ 1975 pastoral letter "This Land is Home to Me" as well as movements and organizations such as the ecumenical Commission on Religion in Appalachia (CORA). McCauley’s critique raises the question of what liberation theology is and what the difference between the appropriation of liberationist themes and the actual practice of liberation theology means in Appalachia. This paper argues that this distinction is important and that liberation theology has actually been practiced, and not just its language appropriated, in movements such as the Catholic Committee of Appalachia (the group which gave birth the Catholic pastoral letters) and CORA whose theologies have not only spoken of liberation but have been rooted in liberating praxis. The legacy of these traditions is not without ambiguity, yet these dynamic movements have not stood still, thus McCauley’s call for Appalachian liberation theologies to examine their relationships with Appalachian mountain religion should continue to inspire further reflection and concrete  relational practices toward new, liberating Appalachian theologies.

Humans have lived with nonhuman animals in the Appalachian Mountains for thousands of years. The relationships formed between these two groups of life have changed over the course of that time, but remained complex, nonetheless. This thesis begins to study Appalachian human-animal relationships by dissecting various relationships represented in prominent works of Appalachian literature, such as Harriette Simpson Arnow’s Hunter’s Horn, Wilma Dykeman’s The Tall Woman, and James Still’s River of Earth. This study moves through some of the current trends in the field of Critical animal studies (CAS) and, for the first time, pairs these trends with different concepts scholars have created in the varying disciplines under the umbrella of Appalachian studies. “Appalachian Animals on Our Mind” begins with a brief history of interactions between animals and humans in Appalachia, then moves into an analysis of literature. This thesis uses the literature to further examine differing human-anim...

Detailed analysis of the origins, contested meanings, and legacies of the controversial “jerking exercise” of the Great Revival (1799-1805). Emphasizes the formative role of the jerks in the development of western Shakerism and the rise of independent Holiness-Penetcostal churches in Appalachia.

In this evocative ethnography, Omri Elisha examines the hopes, frustrations, and activist strategies of American evangelical Christians as they engage socially with local communities. Focusing on two Tennessee megachurches, Moral Ambition reaches beyond political controversies over issues such as abortion, same-sex marriage, and public prayer to highlight the ways that evangelicals at the grassroots of the Christian Right promote faith-based causes intended to improve the state of social welfare. The book shows how these ministries both help churchgoers embody religious virtues and create provocative new opportunities for evangelism on a public scale. Elisha challenges conventional views of U.S. evangelicalism as narrowly individualistic, elucidating instead the inherent contradictions that activists face in their efforts to reconcile religious conservatism with a renewed interest in compassion, poverty, racial justice, and urban revivalism.

The practice of Pentecostal Christians' handling serpents in their religious services, often associated with poor white Protestants in the Appalachian mountains, has received a great deal of scholarly attention, which in turn has generated a series of explanations. One explanation points to a key biblical text: Mark 16: 17-18 advises Christians to demonstrate the power of their faith by taking up serpents, among other signs. If that reference, in and of itself, accounts for this practice, then serpent handling is merely obedience to a biblical ...