When people ask me to explain the South, I usually don’t have an answer beyond saying it’s too big, complex, and varied to pin down easily—or at all. If I’m asked about our editorial mission, I say it is to “explore the South,” which is meant to convey a few things, including that we don’t expect or claim to know everything about the South. Who can know everything about it? The South keeps changing and surprising even as it’s studied. … If Garden & Gun just stuck to its, well, Pistils & Pistols, and merely revealed, with freshened-up accuracy, which elite group it is that they serve (versus claiming that they speak for all), even my snarkiness would dissipate. Such directness on their part wouldn’t even have to be costly—or sweeping. It could be achieved with a tweaking of the motto that appears on every G&G cover. This motto debuted in 2007 as “21st Century Southern America.” Then it was changed to: “Soul of the New South.” Then it was changed to: “Soul of the South.” Change it one last time and the truth shall set us free. Change it to: “The Soul of the Old South.
Oxford American editor Marc Smirnoff’s dismantling of Garden & Gun is totally cutting, totally smart and totally overdue. It makes me proud to be a Southerner as well as an OA contributor. (via rachael-maddux)

(via scuffalong)

Source: oxfordamerican.org

38 Notes/ Hide

  1. ruflopez reblogged this from rachael-maddux
  2. zoewithtwodots reblogged this from themidtownarchive and added:
    I’ll admit I get this magazine in the mail, but I’ll also admit I agree with everything said, above.
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  13. e-rw reblogged this from totalvibration and added:
    finally, something that enunciates that uneasy feeling i get from garden and gun, especially that stereotype-rich piece...
  14. ephemerama reblogged this from totalvibration and added:
    So glad he called out that awful Allison Glock piece in G&G a few months back… “To see the difference between The...
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