In 2007, Professor Susan E. Keefe of the Department of Anthropology at Appalachian State University led an ethnographic field school in Alleghany County. An ethnographic field school allows students to use the techniques of the anthropologist (principally participant observation and interviewing) in order to describe and understand the meaning of a people’s way of life. Students in the field school were placed with host families with whom they lived for four weeks. For the most part, students learned by living and talking to members of their host family, the family’s relatives, their friends, and their neighbors.
The research papers in the collection were produced by six students in the field school. While each paper investigates only a single aspect of life there, the collection as a whole gives insight into the culture of this rural Appalachian county.
Alleghany County lies in the northwestern corner of North Carolina. It has one of the smallest populations of any county in the state (9,591 in 1990), and the county seat, Sparta (population 1,957), is the only town in the county. The economy is based on agriculture, manufacturing, and tourism. The Blue Ridge Parkway winds along the southern boundary of the county, introducing tourists since the 1930s to the natural beauty of the area.
– Information from the Preface
Please, Don’t Tread on Me: A Case Study of a Dairy Farm in the Appalachian South
-Amer Awad
The Effect of the Blue Ridge Parkway on Appalachian Farmers
-Shawna Chesto
Women’s Work in Alleghany County, NC
-Heidi M. Efird
Identity in a Mountain Family
-Kathryn L. Staley
It’s All Legal Until You Get Caught: Moonshining in the Southern Appalachians
-Jason Sumich
Making and Marketing Baskets: A Case Study of Basket Makers in Alleghany County, NC
-Miyuki Honda
