How the United States underdeveloped Appalachia
Steven Stoll is a professor of history at Fordham University and the author of The Great Delusion (Hill and Wang, 2008) and Larding the Lean Earth (Hill and Wang, 2002). His writing has appeared in Harper's Magazine, Lapham's Quarterly, and the New Haven Review.
Short-listed for the 2018 Phi Beta Kappa Ralph Waldo Emerson Book
Award "The book is a masterpiece of panoramic history." --Peter
Lewis, Minneapolis Star Tribune "Mr. Stoll, a history professor at
Fordham University, marshals his extensive knowledge of ancient and
modern economic systems to present a compelling and persuasive
argument . . . "Ramp Hollow" adds an eerie sense of d�j� vu to the
present-day arguments over what, if any, benefits Appalachian
communities are reaping from Marcellus shale drilling." --Steve
Halvonik, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette "Meticulously researched . . .
Those who associate 'academic' with 'dry' will be pleasantly
surprised: the book's prose is light and readable . . . The book's
great strength is that it acknowledges something our politics often
fails to: that not everyone wants the same things or possesses the
same preferences . . . Challenging, interesting and engrossing."
--J.D. Vance, The New York Times Book Review "Stunning . . .
Everything the real hillbillies wanted [J.D]. Vance to acknowledge
is laid out majestically . . . Ramp Hollow offers a granular
chronicle of how wealth, poverty and inequality accrete, layer upon
generational layer . . . [It] should be read . . . for the
compassion and historical attention that Mr. Stoll devotes to this
long-maligned region . . ." --Beth Macy, The Wall Street Journal
"Powerful and outrage-making . . . Gravid and well made . . . A
painstaking history of how public land became real estate . . .
Stoll clings to a history of what the United States could be. His
book becomes a withering indictment of rapacious capitalism."
--Dwight Garner, The New York Times "A searching economic and
political history . . . Stoll's sharp book complicates our
understanding of a much-misunderstood, much-maligned region that
deserves better than it has received." --Kirkus Reviews "Stoll
identifies [Appalachian poverty], correctly, as a consequence of
dispossession. By giving it a distinct pedigree, he helps readers
understand why Appalachia became poor and why it has stayed that
way for so long . . . He is an appealing writer . . . Stoll's
insights on how Appalachia became what it is today are an important
corrective to flawed commentary about a much-maligned place."
--Sarah Jones, Publishers Weekly "In Ramp Hollow, Steven Stoll has
written both a scholarly masterpiece about the history of
dispossessed men and women and a profoundly humane critique of
capitalism in the present as well as the past. Anyone who reads
this book will never think about the people who live in 'coal
country' the same way again." --Michael Kazin, author of War
Against War: The American Fight for Peace, 1914-1918 and editor of
Dissent "A deep and moving chronicle of dispossession, Steven
Stoll's Ramp Hollow manages, like no other account I have seen, to
combine a subtle understanding of Appalachian subsistence practices
with a global understanding of the importance of the commons.
Erudite, conceptually powerful, magnificently documented, and
deeply sympathetic, Ramp Hollow is an instant classic of agrarian
history." --James C. Scott, Sterling Professor of Political Science
and Professor of Anthropology, Yale University
"Ramp Hollow is a bold, imaginative, and eminently readable book
that opens up vital questions about how we think about the history
of alternatives within a dominant capitalist social order. Anchored
in the lives of Appalachian farmers, it has enormous sweep, making
telling observations about patterns of subsistence farming and
dispossession around the world. One can see Steven Stoll drawing on
his enormous wealth of knowledge about farming and rural life, and
his voice is always direct and compelling. I think it is an
extraordinary achievement." --Elizabeth Blackmar, Professor of
History, Columbia University
"Steven Stoll's book will be powerfully influential. He begins in
the hollows and follows the trail to global insights. We're deep in
the dirt, then deep into texts. It's a difficult feat to pull off,
but he accomplishes it in a way that is not only enlightening but
glorious." --John Mack Faragher, Howard R. Lamar Professor of
History and American Studies, Yale University "In this sweeping,
provocative study, Steven Stoll comes to the defense of American
pioneers and smallholders everywhere. Focusing on the mountaineers
of West Virginia, Stoll argues that a largely successful household
mode of production, connected to a larger ecological commons, was
not isolated and backwards until it was impoverished by industrial
invasion. He ties the undermining of Appalachia highlanders back to
the enclosing of early-modern Britain, and to the continuing
dispossession of African smallholders today." --Brian Donahue,
Brandeis University
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