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What the Institute Is. The Abbeville
Institute is an association of scholars in higher education
devoted to a critical study of what is true and valuable in
the Southern tradition. The Institute conducts seminars and
conferences for college and graduate students, and guides
research and publication on all aspects of the Southern tradition.
The Institute is not a Southern heritage preservation society,
nor is it concerned merely with the history of the region.
Its work is more philosophic in nature, namely to explore
the metaphysical image of things human and divine to which
the Southern tradition bears witness. This includes seeking
to understand the value of those features of community that
promote an enduring and humane order: the importance of private
property, place, piety, humility, manners, classical liberal
studies, rhetoric, and the importance of a human scale to
political order. We are interested both in what those values
intimate for our own time, and in how they came to be features
of the Southern tradition.
Why the Institute was Founded. In a
healthy society, education is the thoughtful enjoyment of
a cultural inheritance. But American society today is in the
grip of an ideological culture war. During the last thirty
years, colleges and universities have come to be dominated
by the ideologies of multiculturalism and political correctness.
The result is that the distinctly Southern interpretation
of American history and identity is simply not taught. If
the Southern tradition is mentioned at all, it is usually
vilified as little more than a mask for racism. In ignoring
or eliminating the Southern tradition, much that is good and
noble in American life is rendered inexplicable; but perhaps
more importantly one erases from memory a valuable intellectual
and spiritual resource for exposing and correcting the errors
of American modernity.
Eugene
Genovese, a distinguished historian of the South--a northerner
and a man of the left--has been a rare voice in criticizing
this purge of the Southern tradition from the academy. In
the Massey Lectures given at Harvard, he had this to say:
"Rarely these days, even on southern campuses, is it
possible to acknowledge the achievements of the white people
of the South...To speak positively about any part of this
southern tradition is to invite charges of being a racist
and an apologist for slavery and segregation. We are witnessing
a cultural and political atrocity--an increasingly successful
campaign by the media and an academic elite to strip young
white southerners, and arguably black southerners as well,
of their heritage, and, therefore, their identity. They are
being taught to forget their forebears or to remember them
with shame."
The
Goals of the Institute. This condition is not going to
change overnight. Those who created it are tenured, and will
dominate in higher education for at least a generation-- and
even longer since they are disposed to hire and tenure only
their own. Even so, there are many scholars in America and
abroad who take inspiration from the Southern tradition, and
many others who are open to what it has to teach. Students
too are open. Many feel they are somehow encountering on campus
a profound intellectual and spiritual disorder, but they do
not know how to think about it.
What
is needed is an association of faculty and students outside
the university--but connected to it--where new questions can
be raised and new lines of research explored. Students who
attend Institute events discover faculty with national and
international reputations who have a different, and more thoughtful
conception of the Southern tradition and of its place in the
increasingly contested question of American identity. Armed
with scholarly understanding and the lineaments of a different
program of research, students return to the university better
able to engage in fruitful debate with their teachers and
fellow students.
In addition to education, the
Institute provides a circle of fellowship for students and
faculty. We keep in touch with students, providing academic
support, and advising them about programs of study, graduate
schools, scholarships, fellowships, and grants. After graduation
from their respective colleges or universities, we provide
assistance in getting them placed in teaching, research, or
other professional positions.
Programs.
The Institute conducts three main programs:
(1) Summer School: an annual summer school for
undergraduate and graduate students. The summer school is
held at different locations in the South.
(2 ) Scholars' Conference: an annual scholar's conference
where Institute faculty, and invited scholars, meet to present
papers for criticism and to discuss plans for advancing the
academic goals of the Institute in respect to research, publication,
and teaching.
(3) Jefferson Seminars: Thomas Jefferson is an icon of the Southern tradition, thoroughly rooted in his regional culture, but with a speculative mind eager to explore every area of learning. A Jefferson Seminar is usually a one day affair, designed to provide the public with an opportunity to explore serious topics in a convivial setting. Jefferson was not a great public speaker, but he was a master of the eithteenth century art of conversation. We seek to revive that tradition of conversation in the Jefferson seminars. These are arranged by local supporters and associations and are kept small, in the range of 10 to 25 participants.
Donations. Being a 501
(c) 3 organization under the Internal Revenue Code, all contributions
to the Abbeville Institute are tax deductible. For inquiries
about the Institute or about contributions please
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