The election of Barack Obama as President of the United States opened a window for an examination of the most recent round of demographic, social and economic change in the American South. Using the 2008 election—in which the nation's first black president won three states of the former Confederacy—as a launching pad for analysis, this paper presents a South that has become metropolitan-driven, more prosperous and economically diverse than ever in its history. The paper also depicts a South with inter-regional differences and with distinct inequalities, especially in income and educational attainment.
BernsteinJared, McNicholElizabeth, and LyonsKaren, “Pulling Apart: A State-by-State Analysis of Income Trends,”Center on Budget and Policy Priorities and Economic Policy Institute, 2006. http://www.cbpp.org
2.
Council of the Southern Community, Southern Growth Policies Board, www.southern.org
KeyV.O.Jr., Southern Politics in State and Nation, originally published 1949 by Alfred A. Knopf Inc., new edition published 1984 by University of Tennessee Press.
6.
“Report on Economic Conditions of the South,” Prepared for the President by The National Emergency Council, July 25, 1938.
7.
The State of the South, reports to the region, by MDC, Inc., Chapel Hill. 2004, 2007 and 2010. www.mdcinc.org
8.
VannWoodward C., “The Particular Politics of Being Southern,” an essay in The Prevailing South, Dudley Clendinen, editor. Atlanta: Longstreet Press Inc; 1988.
