ìHillbilly Elegyî would make the ideal holiday gift because it contains a bushel full of truths. These cold, hard facts should be faced, not only in the Greater Appalachian Region, but across the nation. J.D. Vance subtitled his book, ìA memoir of a family and a culture in crisis,î and paints a rather bleak portrait of his society, whose members all carry the genes of their Scots-Irish ancestors. Yet, unlike other books depicting a decaying culture, Vance offers common-sense solutions; ones that donít require a great infusion of federal or local funds. This book mixes history with an introspective examination of one of the largest subcultures in America. We call them hillbillies, rednecks and whitetrash. Vance calls them his relatives and neighbors. He writes, ìI identify with the millions of working-class white Americans of Scots-Irish descent who have no college degree.î How is that possible, since Vance received a law degree from Yale? As the book progresses, you will understand why some cultural traits, whether desirable or not, have more staying power than others. Vance begins with an encapsulated history of the Scots-Irish, who began fleeing the British Empire in search of a better life in America in the 18th Century. While they spread from coast to coast, a large majority of them were drawn to the Appalachian Mountains, which stretch from Georgia in the south, to parts of Ohio and New York in the north. They brought with them their religion, culture and customs, including an extreme sense of loyalty to family and country. They tended to band together, living near ìtheir own kind.î Many ethnic groups did this with good results, but the practice had a harmful effect on the Scots-Irish immigrants. Generations of living in isolated regions only reinforced their prejudices against people who did not look, talk or act like them. Yet, that was not the most harmful consequence of their cutoff existence. Members of their group who decided to improve their lot in life met, and still meet, resistance from their relatives and community. By the middle of the 19th Century, they worked as sharecroppers or coal miners, and joined the armies of Lincoln or Lee in the Civil War. When the mines played out after World War II, whole towns migrated to the steel mills, in what we now call the Rust Belt. This is where Vanceís personal life becomes linked to his Appalachian kin. While he spent much of his childhood in Middletown, Ohio, he always considered ìthe coal mining town of Jackson, Kentucky, to be home.î Thatís where his cousins still live. Itís the birthplace of Mamaw and Papaw, his maternal grandparents, who resided there before moving north to Ohio in the 1950s. In Middletown, they found a community filled with people from home. At age 31, Vance is the first to admit that he is too young to write a memoir. And I would have agreed with him, if he hadnít used his life as scaffolding from which to deliver his social commentary. Vanceís childhood was filled with less-than-perfect people, yet he labels none of them as villains. Each were, in some way, ìgood enough,î to give him a shot at a bright future. However, taken in its entirety, his childhood definitely marked him for failure. Reading about the events that shaped his life isnít easy. Vance grew up in a world where yelling was the norm, and disagreements were often settled with brute force. His family is related to the Hatfield clan, so call it a family tradition, but I couldnít escape the similarity between the words ìblood feudî and ìdomestic abuse.î Abandoned by his father at a young age, Vance learned to adjust his behavior as he navigated through a series of men his mother, Bev, brought into their home. Sadly, she was addicted to alcohol and to the many drugs she could procure in her job as a nurse. These substances often made her unfit to be a mother. But Vance credits her with teaching him to love reading, as he fondly recalls their trips to the library. While the odds seemed to be stacked against Vance, he did have an older sister, Lindsay, and Mamaw and Papaw who loved and cared for him. They were his salvation, providing him with a sanctuary when it was needed. As he started school, he encountered another negative aspect of his culture. Doing well in school is seen as a feminine pursuit. A male with a quest for knowledge is bullied and called a ìpussy.î However, his grandparents, who barely had an eighth-grade education, demanded that Vance do well in school. Even so, during his turbulent teen years, he bounced between households, living with his estranged father or unstable mother. His grades suffered, to the point where he almost failed. That outcome wouldnít have phased his neighbors; Vance lived in a community tangled in a web of lower expectations. It was time to send in the Marines. Vance credits a stint in the service with opening a whole new world to him. He adds, ìMarine Corps boot camp, with its barrage of challenges big and small, began to teach me I had underestimated myself.î After surviving the Marines, he was prepared for college and a successful career. Today, this is what he has to say about the Greater Appalachian Region, ìFrom low social mobility to poverty to divorce and drug addiction, my home is a hub of misery.î Nothing seals this regionís fate more than its inhabitantsí pessimistic view of life. Instead of working to improve their future, they tend to play the ìblame game.î And it is those with a higher education and income whom they fault for all of their personal woes. Saddled with this notion, their children wait for whatever fate befalls them. While Vance points out the myriad of problems faced by these working-class Americans, ìHillbilly Elegyî is certainly not a ìbleeding-heart tale.î If anything, he receives the most criticism for his straight-shooting narrative. He criticizes welfare and social service programs for adding to the decline of family ties, but always returns to the same point. The socioeconomic problems faced by his kin are of their own making. Hereís a brief list of his solutions. Ending the downward spiral of the white working-class poor requires a change in their mindset. Children and young adults need to understand their fate is not determined by their current economic status. Vance writes that education, a stable family environment and the knowledge that you are in control of your future offers ìa way out of the holler.î Be sure to read his description of a ìHillbilly Christmas,î as opposed to how upper-class families celebrate the holiday. Then give the gift of books to everyone on your holiday list. An elegy is a mournful poem, but Vanceís memoir proves his success wasnít a fluke of nature. We can improve our lives, and that of others around us, by heeding his message. Read ìHillbilly Elegy.î
