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Forum for Modern Language Studies 2004 40(3):259-278; doi:10.1093/fmls/40.3.259
© 2004 by Court of the University of St Andrews
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"What Ain't Called Melungeons is Called Hillbillies": Southern Appalachia's In-Between People

Rachel Rubin

American Studies Program, University of Massachusetts Boston, 100 Morrissey Boulevard, Boston, MA 02125 USA

The essay investigates literary evocations of Appalachia's "in-between" people, the Melungeons. Melungeons are deployed by some as mystery (no one has conclusively traced their origins) and by others as solid fact (they are non-white) to shore up their own contingent sense of white privilege. The construction of Melungeon identity by outsiders has facilitated a process of "re-centring" whereby those poor white people so frequently scorned as "hillbillies" place themselves at the heart of a racialised mountain landscape.

Key Words: Melungeon; Whiteness; Haun, Mildred; Stuart, Jesse; Hillbilly; Smith, Lee; In-Between People; Appalachia


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