In a Land of Strangers: Northern Teachers in the Old South, 1790-1865

FAIN: FA-251464-17

Michael T. Bernath
University of Miami (Coral Gables, FL 33146-2919)

A book-length study on northerners who served as teachers, tutors, and governesses in the antebellum South, their employers, and the growth of sectional differences.

My book project focuses on the thousands of northerners who worked as teachers, tutors, and governesses in the southern states from 1790 to 1865. It analyzes what their experiences, observations, and reception reveal about life and culture in the Old South, paying particular attention to evidence of emerging northern and southern identities during the antebellum period. The presence of these teachers represents the most widespread, sustained, and intimate contact point between northerners and southerners at a time when sectional tensions emerged and then escalated. Uniquely, if sometimes uncomfortably, positioned within southern society, these northern teachers provide the ideal vantage point from which to explore perceptions of sectional difference and distinctiveness and to chart the emergence and contours of American identity.

Associated Products

Our Yankee: The Uncertain Fate of Northern Teachers in the Seceded South (Article)
Title: Our Yankee: The Uncertain Fate of Northern Teachers in the Seceded South
Author: Michael T. Bernath
Abstract: By 1861, northern teachers had long occupied a unique place within southern society. Collectively denounced as dangerous foreign agents, individually, southerners placed great trust in their own “Yankee” teacher. Thus, these northerners presented a dilemma for Confederates when the war came, and there was an escalating tension between public and private perceptions. Northern teachers, too, struggled over what to do. A surprising number stayed. Some declared their allegiance to the Confederacy, but others did not, hoping they could maintain their apolitical status. That they thought they could do so says much about the nature of sectional identity and the perceived relationship between the individual and the nation. That, for most of them, these hopes would be dashed says something else about the pressures of war and the growing demands of nationalism.
Year: 2018
Access Model: Subscription
Format: Journal
Publisher: Civil War History

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