Grave History: Death, Race, and Gender in Southern Cemeteries

Grave History explores the significance of southern cemeteries in interrogating and analyzing southern society and the construction of racial and gendered hierarchies from the antebellum period through the dismantling of Jim Crow. It utilizes an interdisciplinary approach, involving scholars from various fields, to investigate the history of racial segregation in southern cemeteries and its implications for understanding power relations, community formation, and historical memory. The book offers learning activities for readers to apply its insights to their analysis of cemeteries.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 277 pages
Publication date: 15 December 2023
Publisher: University of Georgia Press

Grave sites provide not only physical markers of those remembered but also a wealth of information about the era in which the cemeteries were created. These markers hold keys to our historical past and allow an entry point for interrogation about who is represented, as well as how and why. Grave History is the first volume to use southern cemeteries to interrogate and analyze southern society and the construction of racial and gendered hierarchies from the antebellum period through the dismantling of Jim Crow. Through an analysis of cemeteries throughout the South, including Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Maryland, Missouri, and Virginia, from the nineteenth through twenty-first centuries, this volume demonstrates the importance of using the cemetery as an analytical tool for examining power relations, community formation, and historical memory. Grave History brings together an interdisciplinary group of scholars, including historians, anthropologists, archaeologists, and social-justice activists, to investigate the history of racial segregation in southern cemeteries and what it can tell us about how ideas regarding race, class, and gender were informed and reinforced in these sacred spaces. Each chapter is followed by a learning activity that offers readers an opportunity to do the work of a historian and apply the insights gleaned from this book to their own analysis of cemeteries. These activities, designed for both the teacher and the student, as well as the seasoned and the novice cemetery enthusiast, encourage readers to examine cemeteries for their physical organization, iconography, sociodemographic landscape, and identity politics.

Weight: 470g
Dimension: 152 x 228 x 24 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9780820365800