Select language, opens an overlay

Comment

Hillbilly Elegy

a Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis
Nov 20, 2018DavidSpencer99 rated this title 4 out of 5 stars
Vance has constructed this heartwarming story to sort out his conflicted feelings, the culturally ingrained emotions that, by extension, he suspects his fellow Scots-Irish Appalachians share. Vance’s feelings pretty much begin and end with family loyalty shared by residents of “the holler” in Kentucky, but inferiority and defensiveness go with him to Ohio and stay with him through years in public school, the Marine Corps, Ohio State University, Yale Law School, and the writing of his book. What is the nature of such feelings? The hillbilly harbors a “deep skepticism of the very institutions of our society…becoming more and more mainstream. …Social psychologists have shown the group belief is a powerful motivator in performance. …if you think it’s hard to get ahead even when you try, then why try at all?” No amount of success can change that mindset, but J.D. and a few others in his family do counter-balance the negatives of hillbilly mindset with the positives of healthy family ties and a middle-class income. For Vance, a mentor or role model is the crucial factor. “Each [successful person] benefited from the same types of experience in one way or another. They had a family member they could count on. And they saw—from a family friend, an uncle, or a work mentor—what was available and what was possible.” His grandmother and his sister provided stability. His teachers and drill instructors guided him to new habits. He tells his story in sentences at an eighth-grade readability level that almost any reader could manage. Most of the subject matter is lightweight, even the occasional references to sources in academic literature. We get prurient incidents like the Kentucky businessman who takes an electric saw to the truck driver who insulted his sister. Vance teases us with the question: How did he do it? How did the hillbilly with no financial means graduate from Yale Law? Don’t take this story as a formula for upward mobility. We get no proportions of positives to negatives, no crucial combination needed to escape the mindset of the holler. As a result, it left me a little unsatisfied, taking away a few anecdotes but no break-through insights.