To Live Here, You Have to Fight: How Women Led Appalachian Movements for Social Justice | 
My friend bought this book for me because she thought I would be interested in the role of Appalachian women -- my foremothers -- in the modern fight for civil rights. She's right, as far as it goes, because I'm interested -- but this book is too academic and dry for me to get more than a few pages in. Sorry ladies #bookspin #bail
pickI‘m not sure how to sum up this book. The writing has a textbook feel to it & there‘s a lot of info about commissions, organizations, etc, so I read it in sections to prevent distraction. I loved the stories of the women who were activists for economic, health care, and environmental rights in Appalachia in the 60‘s & 70‘s. I kept wondering what happened after that, & the author answers that question toward the end. These women were badasses. 👇
I came across this quote earlier in my #bookspin book. Eula Hall, an Appalachian activist, fought for welfare & other rights. In 1971, she was in a March for Survival in DC & met with policy makers. Afterward, back in Ky, in a meeting w/ organizers, she “declared, ‘I think we ought to send a woman to be president.‘ Someone else chimed in, ‘What about a hillbilly?‘ Laughing, they all agreed that Washington politics could use a good shake-up.” 💚
The tagged is my #bookspin book, which I was planning to read this month either way. I had a couple of other books I was planning to start today, but after the emotional toll of the last few books (plus I‘m listening to Columbine), I need a rom-com. I got both of these at the book fair in November & met the authors.
I‘ve been wanting to read the tagged book for awhile, but of course, I hadn‘t gotten around to it yet. So, i was really excited that the author was coming to the fair this year. Cinderella Sweeping up—hard to explain, but I have personal connections to the author‘s cousins, she is part of a long-time political family in Ky, & I liked her first book. I Am Not Nobody has true stories of women in Appalachia at the New Opportunity School for Women.
so-soIt is a somewhat dry academic book with a very narrow focus—working class, female anti-poverty activists in the eastern Kentucky coal country during the War on Poverty and it‘s aftermath—but I enjoyed it nonetheless and learned a lot. Full review - https://hillbillyhighways.wordpress.com/2019/05/09/nonfiction-to-live-here-you-h...
“As in the past, Appalachia was a way to signal a host of characteristics all at once: white, working-class, postindustrial, impoverished, bigoted, uneducated, and filled with resentment over so-called big government, but also reliant on public assistance programs like Medicaid and disability.” #HillbillyStudies
