Deep South Double Bill
Author Arlie Hochschild in conversation with journalist Adam Hochschild

Due to a family emergency, J.D. Vance will not be available for this program. Books will be on sale.

Two authors, one from California, one from Kentucky, discuss the forces that have driven the southern white working class into angry right wing radicalism.

Strangers in their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right, A Journey to the Heart of our Political Divide (New Press)

In this intriguing book, Arlie Hochschild embarks on a journey to find explanations for the paradoxes of this remarkable political era. For five years, she traveled into a stronghold of the far right: Louisiana bayou country. Her mission: to truly listen to the other side in order to understand why they believe—and feel—the way they do. She discovers powerful forces which override self-interest, and help explain the emotional appeal of a candidate like Donald Trump.

Arlie Russell Hochschild is one of the most influential sociologists of her generation. She is the author of nine books, including The Second Shift, The Time Bind, The Managed Heart, and The Outsourced Self. Three of her books have been named as New York Times Notable Books of the Year and her work appears in sixteen languages. The winner of the Ulysses Medal as well as Guggenheim and Mellon grants, she lives in Berkeley, California.

Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis (Harper)

Income inequality, class warfare, and the plight and anger of the white working class, have become hot button issues in the 2016 Presidential election. J.D. Vance's anguished and authoritative reckoning with this culture is portrayed in his account of his family's multi-generational journey from Appalachia to Yale Law School—two worlds that couldn't be farther apart. Vance gives readers a timely examination of this crucial demographic from Appalachia and the Rust Belt, where Vance himself grew up.

J.D. Vance grew up in the Rust Belt city of Middleton, Ohio, and the Appalachian town of Jackson, Kentucky, He enlisted in the Marine Corps after high school and served in Iraq. A graduate of the Ohio State University and Yale Law School, he has contributed to the National Review and is a principal at a leading Silicon Valley investment firm. Vance lives in San Francisco with his wife and two dogs.

Adam Hochschild (Moderator) is on the faculty of UC Berkeley's Graduate School of Journalism and is a best-selling author. His recent publications include Spain in Our Hearts: Americans in the Spanish Civil War, 1936–1939 and To End All Wars: A Story of Loyalty and Rebellion, 1914-1918, which won the Dayton Literary Peace Prize and was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. He is also noted for King Leopold's Ghost: a Story of Greed, Terror and Heroism in Colonial Africa, which won a J. Anthony Lukas Award (US) and the Duff Cooper Prize (England); Bury the Chains: Prophets and Rebels in the Fight to Free an Empire's Slaves, which was a finalist for the 2005 National Book Award and won the Los Angeles Times Book Prize.