Liberating Our Past (1984)

Regions, like people, undergo constant change, and the most dramatic shifts often lead to alterations in self understanding. Every time we "start over," we begin to see and explain ourselves a little differently. In the 15 years between 1954 and 1969, the American South experienced a painful and exhilarating struggle for social liberation that was long overdue. That many-sided movement stimulated a less visible but equally complicated and hopeful struggle to set the region's history "free at last." This volume is a progress report on the continuing effort to liberate the Southern past.

The people doing the liberating over the past 15 years span several generations, and even continents. Many have received formidable professional training; others have informed themselves in public libraries. But all — through reading old letters and conversing on front porches — have learned from Southerners whose lives have been distorted or dismissed by earlier historians.