Southern, David W. 1938–

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Southern, David W. 1938–

PERSONAL:

Born February 19, 1938, in Great Bend, KS; son of Arnett David (a farmer) and Maxine Southern; married Judith Marie Jarvis (a teacher), December 30, 1961 (divorced, 1971); children: Sheri Lee. Education: Alderson-Broaddus College, B.A., 1964; Wake Forest University, M.A., 1965; Emory University, Ph.D., 1971.

ADDRESSES:

Office—Department of History, Westminster College, Fulton, MO 65251.

CAREER:

North Carolina Wesleyan College, Rocky Mount, instructor in history, 1965-67; Westminster College, Fulton, MO, assistant professor of history, beginning 1970. Military service: U.S. Air Force, 1956-60.

MEMBER:

Organization of American Historians, American Historical Association.

WRITINGS:

The Malignant Heritage: Yankee Progressives and the Negro Question, 1901-1914, Loyola University Press (Chicago, IL), 1968.

Gunnar Myrdal and Black-White Relations: The Use and Abuse of an American Dilemma, 1944-1969, Louisiana State University Press (Baton Rouge, LA), 1987.

John LaFarge and the Limits of Catholic Interracialism, 1911-1963, Louisiana State University Press (Baton Rouge, LA), 1996.

The Progressive Era and Race: Reaction and Reform, 1900-1917, Harlan Davidson (Wheeling, IL), 2005.

Contributor to Northwest Ohio Quarterly, Journal of Southern History, and South Atlantic Quarterly.

SIDELIGHTS:

Westminster College history professor David W. Southern specializes in the history of race relations in the United States during the early twentieth century. His book John LaFarge and the Limits of Catholic Interracialism, 1911-1963 traces the career and works of a Jesuit priest who—despite his conservative, antisecular, anti-Communist background—was also a fervent antiracist. LaFarge helped create and sustain the Black Catholic movement in the United States during much of the twentieth century. He "was one of the first Catholics to denote racism as ‘a mortal sin’ and opposed to the fundamentals of Catholicism," said John Fulton, writing in the Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, "though it took him thirty years to accept segregation as ‘morally wrong.’" "This is an impressive study," concluded University of Notre Dame history professor Jay P. Dolan in the Journal of American Ethnic History, "that fills a void in Catholic history as well as the history of race relations in the United States."

In The Progressive Era and Race: Reaction and Reform, 1900-1917, Southern traces the story of the profound disconnection between the relatively liberal aims of the leaders and followers of the Progressive movement in American politics and their hardening attitude toward race. The Progressive period (roughly lasting from 1890 to 1920) was "a time of hope and experimentation," declared Angela Firkus on the History Teacher Web site, "but one during which racist attitudes about blacks solidified and real conditions for blacks worsened: discriminatory laws increased, economic opportunity declined, and lynching remained an all too common occurrence. Southern argues that ‘race was the major blind spot of the progressives,’" Firkus explained, "and judged by race, the period should be called the ‘regressive’ era." "The wholesale disfranchisement of Southern black voters occurred during these years, as did the rise and triumph of Jim Crow," stated Damon W. Root in Reason. "Furthermore … the very worst of it—disfranchisement, segregation, race baiting, lynching—‘went hand-in-hand with the most advanced forms of southern progressivism.’ Racism was the norm, not the exception, among the very crusaders romanticized by today's activist left." "Only in the 1960s and the ‘Second Reconstruction,’ with strong support at the executive and legislative levels of the federal government," wrote Ralph Peters in Teaching History: A Journal of Methods, "was there finally a link made between ‘progressive’ ideas and racial equality." "This survey," concluded Michael L. Collins in the Journal of Southern History, "adds measurably to our understanding of how and why reactionary forces triumphed over the democratic promise of equality and justice for all Americans, regardless of race or color."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

America, June 22, 1996, Cyprian Davis, review of John LaFarge and the Limits of Catholic Interracialism, 1911-1963, p. 22.

Historian, December 22, 2006, Fred Greenbaum, review of The Progressive Era and Race: Reaction and Reform, 1900-1917, p. 848.

Journal of American Ethnic History, September 22, 1998, Jay P. Dolan, review of John LaFarge and the Limits of Catholic Interracialism, 1911-1963, p. 135.

Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, January 1, 1998, John Fulton, review of John LaFarge and the Limits of Catholic Interracialism, 1911-1963, p. 223.

Journal of Southern History, August 1, 2006, Michael L. Collins, review of The Progressive Era and Race, p. 699.

Reason, May 1, 2006, Damon W. Root, "When Bigots Become Reformers: The Progressive Era's Shameful Record on Race," p. 60.

Reference & Research Book News, November 1, 2005, review of The Progressive Era and Race.

Review of Politics, January 1, 1998, Cyprian Davis, review of John LaFarge and the Limits of Catholic Interracialism, 1911-1963, p. 186.

Teaching History: A Journal of Methods, September 22, 2006, Ralph Peters, review of The Progressive Era and Race, p. 103.