Topic
Clansman
About: Clansman is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 10 publications have been published within this topic receiving 172 citations.
Papers
Book•
1 Jan 1905
TL;DR: In The Clansman as discussed by the authors, the author describes the social, political, and economic disintegration that plagued the South during Reconstruction, depicting the rise of the Ku Klux Klan and the reactions of two families to racial conflict.
Abstract: " The year was 1865. With the close of the Civil War, there began for the South, an era of even greater turmoil. In The Clansman, his controversial 1905 novel, later the basis of the motion picture The Birth of a Nation , Thomas Dixon, describes the social, political, and economic disintegration that plagued the South during Reconstruction, depicting the rise of the Ku Klux Klan and the reactions of two families to racial conflict. This study in social history was alternatively praised and damned by contemporary critics. As historian Thomas D. Clark notes in his introduction, the novel "opened wider a vein of racial hatred which was to poison further an age already in social and political upheaval. Dixon had in fact given voice in his novel to one of the most powerful latent forces in the social and political mind of the South." For modern readers, The Clansman probes the roots of the racial violence that still haunts our society.
180 citations
15 citations
TL;DR: This article argued that the significance of The Clansman is a consequence of the novel's description of post-Civil War Southern Reconstruction, where a dystopic social and political order was overthrown by the determined action of racially unified Anglo-Saxons.
Abstract: Thomas Dixon, Jr.'s novel, The Clansman (1905), typically is described as a boorish example of white racism. In this essay, I argue that the significance of The Clansman is a consequence of the novel's description of post‐Civil War Southern Reconstruction, where a dystopic social and political order was overthrown by the determined action of racially unified Anglo‐Saxons. The negation of this dystopia also anticipates Dixon's vision of Utopia, where Aryans North and South unite to protect their racial heritage. This study (a) reveals the limitations of extant generic guidelines for identifying Utopian discourse and (b) reconsiders the conventional categories (e.g., “radical,” “reactionary") frequently used to describe public discourse. The implications of this argument should be of particular interest to students of social movements.
12 citations
1 Jan 2006
5 citations
Related Topics (5)
Performance Metrics
| Year | Papers |
|---|---|
| 2020 | 1 |
| 2019 | 1 |
| 2018 | 1 |
| 2010 | 1 |
| 2009 | 1 |
| 2007 | 2 |