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The American South, 1865–2000 (HIS2029)

Labour and Civil Rights at a Crossroads
Labour and Civil Rights at a Crossroads:
In the spring of 1968, sanitation workers in Memphis, Tennessee went on strike to protest against low wages and unsafe working conditions. The strike garnered national attention when leaders of the civil rights movement, including Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., expressed support for the strikers’ demands. Facing  determined opposition from the city’s white establishment, the strike developed into a bitter showdown between the segregationist South and those determined to bring about change. King was assassinated on April 4th while in Memphis supporting the strikers.

Level: 2
Semester: 2

Module Co-ordinator: , 

Course Content

Following the Civil War, a bitter struggle broke out--the outcome of which was a “New South” that restored authority to propertied whites and left freed blacks languishing in a “twilight zone between slavery and freedom.” This module explores the period between Reconstruction and the emergence of a Republican South following the backlash to the modern civil rights movement, paying special attention to the relationship between economic transformation and evolving class, race, and gender relations. In what ways did the society built upon the ruins of the Confederacy mark a break with the antebellum past? What were the fracture lines in white society and how were they manifested? How do we explain the emergence of the civil rights movement in the 1950s, after seventy years of seeming acquiescence to Jim Crow?  To what extent was that movement successful in transforming the South? Making use of both primary and secondary materials, film and oral history, this module will explore these and other questions in an attempt to come to terms with the South’s past and its bearing on the United States’ present and future.

Teaching Method

The course is taught through a weekly lecture, tutorial and film screenings. 

Course Assessment

Two questions to be attempted in a two-hour written exam (50%) and one assessed essay (based on assigned readings and an online collection of primary documents) of 3,500-4,000 words including citation and bibliography (40%). Ten percent (10%) of the overall grade will be based on attendance at and regular, informed participation in tutorials.

RETURN TO LEVEL 2 MODULE DESCRIPTIONS