Here Comes Honey Boo Boo, Moonshiners, and Duck Dynasty: The Intersection of Popular Culture and a Southern Place

• In Event: 65.080 - Roundtable Session 24
  In Roundtable Session: 65.080-11 - Me, Myself, and Meme(s): Knowledge Production and Media Culture

Abstract

This paper examines the patterns and underlying meanings associated with popular culture depictions of Southern people as uneducated rednecks, clowns, or social deviants. Stereotypical portrayals reinforce commonly accepted myths and highlight a need for a reconsideration of the ways in which race, gender, sexuality, and social class intersect with one-dimensional representations of Southern people and Southern culture. These images lead to generic and predominantly negative attitudes regarding public policies and politics that directly affect the lives of people living in the South. An in-depth consideration of these negative stereotypes is an important dimension to any critical analysis of situated knowledge and the places that emerge from the intersection of television and Southern culture.

Author

• Eleanor Jane Blair, Western Carolina University