| Book Review | The Journal of American History, 92.2

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| Book Review | The Journal of American History, 92.2 | The History Cooperative

Book Review

Radio and the Struggle for Civil Rights in the South. By Brian Ward. (Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2004. xvi, 437 pp. $39.95, ISBN 0-8130-2729-2.)

Radio and the Struggle for Civil Rights in the South is an incredibly significant study in furthering the history of the civil rights movement. Through extensive research based on a variety of archival documents and oral histories, Brian Ward argues that radio broadcasting was a pivotal arena in shaping southern freedom struggles. Here, Ward carefully probes the tenuous relationship between cultural authority and political action. During the civil rights era, the potential for racially progressive programming in the South was constantly circumscribed by powerful commercial interests. Yet even more stifling was the white southern belief in the Jim Crow order, particularly at the moment when it was unraveling. Ward thoughtfully examines how, even in a racially explosive atmosphere, radio often challenged the southern racial hierarchy, as some stations not only employed interracial staffs but were under the control of white liberals such as Charlotte's Charles Crutchfield and Atlanta's Zenas Sears. Albeit racially moderate, these and other white individuals created stations that reflected a sustained commitment to desegregation.

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