Ideological Language and Social Movement Mobilization

8/8/2019 Ideological Language and Social Movement Mobilization

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Ideological Language and Social Movement Mobilization: A Sociolinguistic Analysis ofSegregationists' IdeologiesAuthor(s): Gerald M. Platt and Rhys H. WilliamsSource: Sociological Theory, Vol. 20, No. 3 (Nov., 2002), pp. 328-359Published by: American Sociological AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3108615Accessed: 19/05/2010 20:17

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Ideological Language and Social Movement Mobilization:A Sociolinguistic Analysis of Segregationists' Ideologies*GERALD M. PLATT

University of Massachusetts, AmherstRHYS H. WILLIAMS

Universitv of Cincinnati

The current "cultural urn"in thestudyof social movementshasproduceda numberofconcepts formulating the cultural-symbolicdimensionof collective actions. Thispro-liferation,however,has resulted n some confusionabout whichcultural-symboliccon-cept is best applied to understandingculturalprocesses involved in social movements.Wearticulate a newdefinition of ideologythat makesit an empiricallyusefulconcepttothe study of social-movement mobilization. It is also formulated as autonomous ofconcepts such as culture and hegemony and of other cultural-symbolic concepts pres-entlv used in the movement literature to explain participant mobilization. We demon-strate the usefulness of our ideology concept by analyzing letters written to MartinLuther King, Jr. from segregationists opposed to the integration of American society.The analysis indicates that the letter writers particularized segregationist culture, cre-ating ideologies that fit their structural, cultural, and immediate circumstances, andthat the ideologies they constructed thereby acted to mobilize their countermovementparticipation. The particularizing resulted infour differentiated ideological versions ofsegregationist culture. The empirically acquired variety of ideological versions is incon-sistent with the role attributed to cultural-symbolic concepts in the social-movementliterature and requires theoretical clarification. We conclude with a discussion of thetheoretical implications for social-movement theory of the variety of segregationistideologies.

Considerthefollowing statements aken fromcorrespondencewrittenby four whiteAmer-icans to Martin LutherKing, Jr.in the mid-1960s:'

The move of the Negroracetowardequalitywith,or even supremacyover,the whiterace is immoral.I quote the law against desegregation,as it stands in Galatians 5:19-21 ... so the attempt... is immoral and is punishableby death, unless thoseinvolved ask God'sforgiveness orthis sin andceasepushing orequalityorsupremacy.

*We wantto thank he MartinLutherKing,Jr.Center or Nonviolent Social Changefor permissionto quotethecorrespondence o Dr. King. Special appreciation or theirhelp is extended to the former directorof the KingLibraryandArchive, Dr. BroadusN. Butler,and to Mrs. CorettaScott King. We also wish to thankGene Fisher,Bill Gamson, BennettaJules-Rosette,Gary Marx, Neil Smelser, MarcSteinberg,and Fred Weinstein for theircommentson theearlierversion of theessay. Addresscorrespondence o: GeraldPlatt,Departmentof Sociology,Universityof Massachusetts,Amherst,MA 01003; e-mail: [email protected] earlier version of this essay entitled, "Ideological Discourse, Segregationist Ideology, and Social Move-ments:A Sociolinguistic Analysis,"was presentedat the annualmeeting of the AmericanSociological Associa-tion, August 9, 1999, Chicago, IL.1For this article, we have edited the lettersfor spelling and typographicalerrors;however, we have preservedthe punctuation,capitalization,and phrasingas faithfullyas is possible in order to convey the 'feeling" of themessage withoutdistractingattentionto the form in which it was expressed.

Sociological Theory 20:3 November 2002? American Sociological Association. 1307 New YorkAvenue NW, Washington, DC 20005-4701


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IDEOLOGICALLANGUAGEAND SOCIALMOVEMENTMOBILIZATIONAfterall, this is a whitemans'country,andif the Negro, who was brought n herebytheEnglish,is not satisfiedwithourway of life, why don't they go back toAfrica,toeducate and civilize theirown people.It is said that ... the groupNAACP[NationalAssociation for the AdvancementofColoredPeople] getspaid well-by Communists,o violatelaws, provokeviolence-anythingfor publicity.... you and your un-Americanemployees-are mercenary... violate all decency for money,largely suppliedby enemies of USA.If you really wantto do somethingfor the Negro race, teach them to live like humanbeings, pull themselves out of thefilthy low down lives they areliving.... Thenyouwould have a race of people that would be acceptable.

These claims are familiar to anyonewho has studied the American civil rightsmovement.They are statements made in letters sent to Dr. King by opponentsof integrationand areexamples of "segregationist ideology." But examine the assertions more closely. Eachrests upon a different ground as to why segregation should be preserved. The first isreligious, claiming thatsegregationis God's will. The second is based in a segregationistinterpretation f Americanhistory.The thirdnegates integrationby associatingit with thegreat symbolic demon of mid-20thcenturyAmerica,communism.The fourth holds out thepotentialforequalityat some unspecifiedfuturedate but claims that,as yet, AfricanAmer-icans are not readyfor that condition.This variety of ideological versions of segregation suggests the need to rethink ourviews of social-movement culture and ideology. Almost every sociological approachtosocial movementstakes the cultural-symboliccomponentof collective action to be unify-ing, producingsolidarity.Whetherthe term is "frame,""identity,""cognitiveliberation,"or "ideology,"sociologists have formulatedthe culturalcomponentas reducingand uni-fying themeaningsmembersof a social movementholdaboutthemovement andthe socialworld.2However, while each ideological statement above opposes integrationand sup-ports a segregationistorder,each also representsa distinct adversarialvision that makessense of a variety of cultural and structural crises confronting the correspondent-interpreters ndJim Crow society (Plattand Williams 1988; Platt and Fraser1998). In the1950s and 1960s, Jim Crow society and the culturalworldview that legitimatedit werethreatenedwith the collapse of theirability to justify andrecapitulate hat order.The fourideological versions areexamplesof the"practical onsciousness"(Giddens 1984:xxiii)or"operative deology" (WilliamsandBlackburn1996:170) thatthese segregationistadher-ents producedto meet these crises.The cultural-symbolicdimensions of social-movementtheorizingare much in debateinthe currentsociological literature.Conceptssuch as "frame,""identity,""cognitiveliber-ation,"and"ideology"areprofferedas most appropriateor the required heoreticaltasks(Snow,Cress,Downey,and Jones 1998;Goodwin andJasper1999;Polletta1998;McAdam1999; OliverandJohnston2000; Snow and Benford2000; BenfordandSnow 2000; Wil-liams and Benford2000). We wish to avoid engaging in "conceptwars,"while still enter-ing this debateby offering a theoreticallyautonomousandempiricallyuseful conceptionof ideology as a cultural-symbolicconcept designed to explain social-movement mobili-

2Werealize this contentionmay be controversial,and will return o the issue in the conclusion. Suffice to sayhere thatexamples from such varied authorsas Snow and colleagues (1986), McAdam (1982), Melucci (1995),and Klandermans 1984, 1988) all view the power of cultureas residing in its unifying the meaning-systemsofmovement adherents.We are arguing for the importanceof ideology, but for the opposite reason-preciselybecause it offers diverse andparticularizedmeanings.

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SOCIOLOGICALTHEORYzation. The power of ideology, we contend, is achieved throughits diverse and oftencontradictoryappeals,not throughits unifying functions. We illustrate the usefulness ofthis conceptionby examining letters from countermovementsupporterssent to Dr. Kingandthe SouthernChristianLeadershipConference(SCLC).

THECONCEPTOF IDEOLOGYOurformulationof ideology narrows ts traditionalmeaningswhile developinga compre-hensive culturalconcept for social-movement mobilization.Ourformulation s also dis-tinctfromthebroadernotionsof cultureandhegemony.Itsuggeststhatmovementadherents'ideologies areexperientiallydesignedversions of thepast, present,and future social orderand that these ideologies organize adherents'cognitive, moral, and emotional practices(see Goodwin,Jasper,and Polletta2001). This conceptualization ntegratesstructural ndculturalfactors, describing how they combine to establish and differentiateideologicalperspectives. Ideology is often inflatedby theorizingthatequates it with the whole sym-bolic world. It is also often deflated by reducingit to a pejorativechargehurledagainstthose who speak for objective truth.3While ideology is not empirically independentofculture,without its conceptual autonomyfrom other symbolic concepts its analyticuse-fulness is hindered.

We drawupon the theorizingof Antonio Gramsci(1971), Clifford Geertz (1973), andRaymondWilliams (1977, 1981) to establish our conception.We begin our inquirywitha provisionalformulationof ideology as an assemblage of ideasprovidingconceptionsofpast, present, andfuture social conditions.4We use the phrases "assemblageof ideas"and "conceptionsof past, present,and future social conditions" because we wish to por-tray ideology as lacking any necessary logical coherence. Further,we conceive of ideol-ogy as constructions of the social world arising from a variety of influences, such ascultural and structuralcircumstances and idealizations about the social world used tointerpret hem.

Ideology is expressed in a numberof symbolic forms, but mostly it is delivered inspoken and writtenlanguage.Therefore,we offer a sociolinguistic analysis of how it isformed,operates,anddifferentiatesnlanguage'suse (Hymes1974;Gumperz1982).Becauseof ideological language's malleability, it provides movement participants,in Giddens'sense, with both agency andorganizationalstructuring Giddens 1984; Sewell 1992). Forthis reason, we formulateideology as a culturalresource for its adherents. It is in thelanguageof ideology that activistsjustify theirparticipation, onstruct heirconceptionsofpast, present, and future social worlds, and orient their moral,cognitive, and emotionalpractices (Platt 1980; Williams 1995). In ideological language, adherentsmobilize andorienttheirmovement activities.

3Geertz(1973) attempted o reformulate he conceptof ideology so as to protect t frombecoming, as he putit,"ideologized."His attempt s more elegant but less systematicthan our effort. He provides less of a handle onhow the concept might be empiricallyused. Additionally,his essay focuses upon producersof ideology. Ouressay focuses on the interpretive anguagethatgroupsof individuals use to transforma culturalworldviewintoa resonantmobilizing ideology.4In this definition of ideology, and in two subsequentelaborationsof it, we privilege neither ideas nor condi-tions, neitherculture norstructure; ather,both are involved in determining he substanceof an ideology (Fields1990). Ourpositionis that deologies expresssome coherence,butthey are not systematic,nor arethey addressedsolely to ideational-cognitive conceptionsof the social world. Ideologies are symbolic, to be sure,but they alsoprovideorientations o andconceptionsof the moral,cognitive, andexpressiveordersof the social world (Jasper1998). The word"assemblage" mplies ideas, symbols, andmeaningsabouta varietyof dimensions,from mate-rial to cultural, romcognitive to expressive andmoral,and frommythto science. Ourconceptionof ideology isinfluencedby its earlierformulations n the symbolic Interactionist raditionof Turnerand Killian (1987), and itresonateswith the recentformulationof ideology found in Oliver andJohnston(2000). See also footnotes 4 and5 below.

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IDEOLOGICALLANGUAGEAND SOCIAL MOVEMENTMOBILIZATIONSome Troublesor an AutonomousConceptionof IdeologyIdeology has often been conceptualizedas false-consciousness thinking(Dant 1991:5-6).It has been conflated with culture andhegemonyin the Marxian radition Althusser1971;Williams1977).And traditional ociology also suggeststhat deology is value-bound hink-ing (Shils 1968).5These approachesproducetwo troubling ssues for anempiricallyusefuland autonomousconceptof ideology: (1) thebelief thatideology consists of ideas imbuedin the masses, creating in them a false consciousness that obscures the reality of theircircumstances(Williams 1977:55);and(2) the incapacityto conceptually distinguishide-ology from othersymbolic processes that orient social practices (Williams 1981:26-30).From its outset, the ontological status of "reality"has been central to the concept ofideology.Marx andEngels (1939), the theorists who brought heconceptinto social analy-sis, conceived of ideology as masking reality, thereby creating an appearanceof realityservingthe interests of the dominantclass. In this tradition, he standard or obtainingtrueknowledge of the social world resides in the analysis of the material conditions of exis-tence, set againstthe ideological conceptionof them.However,the Marxist traditionsoonmoved away from a conceptual dichotomy of appearanceand reality to the creation ofreality by interweaving ideas with material circumstances.Startingwith Engels in 1893(1959) and his concession to ideas and continuing among left theorists for more than acentury,the significance of ideas in social formation has provideda revision of this con-ception of reality. In contemporaryMarxism, ideas and the material operate simulta-neously to create the realitiesin whichpersonsexist. These realities reflect class-based in-terests,butmayalsoincorporate ourgeoisbeliefs (Hall1986a,1986b;Steinberg1994,1999).Writing n the Marxisttradition,Purvis and Hunt(1993) providea theoretical solutionto the problemof ideological distortion versus objective reality. They resolve this dichot-omy by removingtheirconceptionof ideologyfrom thedomainof ontologicaltruth. nstead,they note that"Ideologyis concernedwith the realm of the lived, or the experienced,ratherthan'thinking.'... . [It] implies the existence of some line between 'interests'and 'forms ofconsciousness'" (Purvisand Hunt 1993:479,476). Ideology so formulated s a conscious-ness thatexpresses, among other things, the interests of a particularlysituatedclass andthus constitutes a subjectively constructed truth. Purvis and Hunt conceive of this ideo-logical consciousness as a formof truth,butwith a small "t".It is the truth hatreflects aclass's interpreted, ived experiences and interests but does not provide for ontologicaltruth n the sense of depictinga realityseparate romits social construction.They refer toontological truthas truthwith a capital"T",but consider it beyondreach.

Thinkingof ideology as interest-based,constructedversions of realityinforms our con-ception of ideology as a mobilizingresource.However,the interestsuponwhich ideologyis constructedare those designated by classes of persons as important.There are no fun-damental"rational"ntereststhattrumppeople'sconstructionsof theirown circumstances.Further,we add to our conception of ideology a dimension of the emotion of hoped-forrealities. Thus, ideology incorporatesidealized beliefs also derived from lived experi-ences. These idealizations orient thinking as they mobilize courses of action aimed atpromotingor resisting change. We ask, how do ideologies thatincorporate nterest-based

5Oliverand Johnston refer to theirconception of ideology as a "nonpejorative"ormulation,contrasting t topejorativeconceptions of ideology thatemphasize its reality distortingfunction.They note that there is a corebody of work that "providesa solid basis for investigating ideology in its nonpejorativesense as a system ofmeaning undergirdinga social movement" (Oliver and Johnston2000:42). We concur, and have relied uponsimilarsources to develop our conception of ideology as meaning constructing.However, we conceive of ide-ology as a less coherentassemblageof ideas than do Oliver andJohnston(see 2000:44-45), and we also focusmore on its constructedanddifferentiatedcharacter.We do agreethat deology is a morecomprehensiveculturalconceptionthan frames or framing.And, insofar as "culturalwars"are formsof struggleover culturalresources,we also accept Oliver andJohnston's dea thatideology carries with it a political connotation(Williams 1997).

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IDEOLOGICAL LANGUAGE AND SOCIAL MOVEMENT MOBILIZATIONsuggest that it be hinged to interest-based assemblages of ideas proselytizing for hoped-foror idealized social conditions that do not exist, or interest-based assemblages of ideasadvocating for the perpetuation of social forms experienced as failing. Ideology can beformulated as independent of culture and hegemony if it is confined to ideas advocatinginterest-based social processes oriented to bringing about or resisting change.We may refine our definition of ideology, then, as a symbolic perspective regardingdesired social conditions; it is an assemblage of ideas about the construction of activitiesand circumstances oriented to achieve interests and life experiences as visualized in anidealized past, present, and future.

SPECIFYING IDEOLOGY FURTHERWe do not intend to relativize the concept of ideology. We propose a concept of ideologyformulated as experience-driven, interest-based idealized conceptions of society. This for-mulation ties ideology's construction to its immediate circumstances. Therefore, ideologyis a circumstantially restricted conception of reality, and it is hardly relative (Seliger 1977;Brandist 1996).

Ideology comes into play when cultural meanings and the structuring of the socialworld run into trouble. Gary Marx and Doug McAdam suggest that ideologies arise whencultural meanings and practices become "inadequate, indifferent, or in dispute" (Marx andMcAdam 1994:18). These troubling conditions create subjective experiences of disruptionand undermine people's capacities to employ conventional cultural symbols and routinesocial practices to construct their social worlds. Experiences of cultural and structuraldisruption have been termed "sense-making crises" (Platt 1980:82) and described as "dis-rupting the 'quotidian"' (Snow et al. 1998:1; also see Useem 1998).6 They have beentheorized as cultural and structural conditions that mobilize movement participation.For persons so affected, it becomes problematic to fit practices to the moral conceptionsthat provide authority for one's own and others' activities. Individuals seek explanations inideologies not so much when events in the world cannot be interpreted as when eventsseem-and are experienced as-"uninterpretable" (Williams 1996). Such situations encour-age the search for ideological interpretations of these settings. Individuals in these settingsstruggle to make moral, cognitive, and emotional sense of their experiences by describingthem, finding their causes, and offering solutions in ideological doctrine (Weinstein andPlatt 1973; Weinstein 1990:83-121). In these situations, persons actively construct themeanings of their experiences and the direction of their courses of actions. They use theirideological interpretations as cultural resources or as "normative tools" to make sense oftheir circumstances and to guide their activities (Swidler 1986; Platt 1980; Williams 1995).

6Snow andcolleagues (1998) suggest four conditions that create breakdownsand strains hat foster movementmobilization. They do not claim that this is an exhaustive list of the disruptiveconditions that cause strain.Instead,these conditionsexemplify thecircumstances hatundermine he "quotidian,"he latter ormulated n theSchutzian and Durkheimian traditions as the routine practices and the normative character of everyday life.Withinthatcontext, Snow andcolleagues single out loss as the primarystrain that causes movement mobiliza-tion. They formulate"loss"as the loss of economic or utility resources,rather han as generalizedcultural andsocial psychological experiences within which economic or utility resources are a subcategory.However, it istheoretically appropriate n the Durkheimian and Schutzian traditions to assume that "loss" would not givepriorityto a utilitarianformulation.Instead, loss should be conceived of in terms of the cultural and socialpsychological experiencesof it. Not only would such a formulationbe consistent with social-movementtheoriz-ing derivedfrom DurkheimandSchutz,but-more significantly-it could also providea conceptualframeworkwithin which the authorsmight develop theoretical cohesion among the myriad potential forms of disruption-breakdown-strain-loss onditions.A sizable cultural and social psychological literature n the DurkheimianandSchutzian traditions ocuses upon a generalized conceptionof breakdown,strain, oss, and movement mobiliza-tion (e.g., Geertz 1973; Weinstein and Platt 1973; Weinstein 1990; Emirbayer1996; Useem 1998). Althusser'sclassical Durkheimian-Freudiannfluenced structural tatementon "overdetermination" ould also be helpful inclarifyingthese issues (Althusser1979:87-128).

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SOCIOLOGICALTHEORYThe disruptionof everydaylife and the incapacityto make sense of immediatecondi-tions occur in two forms: (1) the experience of thefailure of extant culturaldoctrine andpractices to cope with and make meaningfulsense of immediatesituations;and (2) theexperienceof the absence of appropriate ulturaldoctrine andpracticesto providefor the

changing circumstances that are developing in society (Platt 1987). Geertz (1973) andSnow andcolleagues(1998) emphasizethe failureof interpretive apacities,but theabsenceof culturaldoctrine and social practices is also influential,as for example, when culturalideals do not exist or the culture is "indifferent"or "in dispute"aboutrecognizing andrewardingthe changing-and often rising-performance capacities amonga categoryorclass of persons (Marx and McAdam 1994:18).Bothforms of interpretationwere exhibitedin the counterreactions o the integrationofAfrican Americans into the mainstreamof American institutional ife. Two of the segre-gationistideological constructionsdescribed below attempt o repairand reasserta segre-gationistculture and its practicesthat were experiencedas failing. Two otherssupplementsegregationistdoctrine with principlesnotusuallyassociatedwith it, advocating deas andpracticesnot usuallyassociated with the conventional southernsegregationistworldview.While theseprincipleswereabsentfromtraditional egregationistculture,theywereexpe-rienced as relevantto the historical circumstances n which integrationoccurredandwereincludedin constructing wo particularized egregationist deologies.Neil McMillen (1971) documents the fact that the circumstancesnoted above fosteredthe rise of the countermovement egregationistorganization he White Citizens' Council(WCC). He emphasizesthat

[w]hile the most fertile soil for the Council'sgerminationwas to be found in black-belt counties, the most salubrious climate for its growthwas that createdby racialcrisis. The storyof Councilexpansion,then, was not one of steadyprogress. Repre-sentedgraphically, ts growthin Mississippi and elsewhere in the South resembledafever chartwith peaks occurring n periodsof racial unrest when the white popula-tion'sperceptionsof the imminenceof desegregationwasgreatest,andslumpscoincid-ing with periodsof relative calm. The first such growth-producing risis came withthe Brown decision in May 1954. (McMillen 1971:28)RhodaBlumberg, n her influentialanalysis,agreesthat the WCC formedin reaction tothe changingcircumstancessignaledby the Brown decision. The "first Citizens' Council... formed in Indianola,Mississippi, in July, 1954 ... determined o resist andnullify theschool desegregationdecision" (Blumberg 1991:203). These accounts suggest that thesouthern countermovementwas constructedfrom several relevant circumstances:apart-heid southernculture formedduringslaveryandJim Crow society; reactionsto the crisescreated for it by the immediate events of SupremeCourt decisions and the executivebranch'senforcementof them;andlocal circumstantial rises created as reactions to legaland activists' efforts to integrateAfrican Americansfully into southernsociety.Ideological discourses are interest- and experience-basedidealizationsoffering alter-nate courses of action;they providesolutions to circumstances hat areperceivedas hav-ing created the uninterpretablemoral, cognitive, and emotional troubling experiences.

They constitutechallenges and substitutes to conventionalcultural interpretations;heyalso constitutesymbolic ways of bolsteringandsupplementing alteringconventional cul-tural nterpretations.deologies emergeamongthose who would changesociety and thosewho would resist change, those who are advocates of the extant but failing conventionalinterpretiveorderand its practices.The result is two types of ideological doctrine: emer-

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IDEOLOGICALLANGUAGEAND SOCIAL MOVEMENTMOBILIZATIONgentideologies oriented o changeandcounterideologiesopposedto theemergingschemes,supportingan extantor past but failing culture.Conflict involving the challenges among ideological interpretationscreates circum-stances in which manydifferentpersonaland collective rationalesfor commitments arise.These struggles amongideological campsareoften couchedas conflicts between truthandfalsity, scientific and biased perspectives,or God-given naturalordersandmisguidedhu-man formulations.We contend that the strugglesare none of these. Instead,they are inter-pretive conflicts among versions of morally appropriatesocial worlds, their change orperpetuationLuker1984).Theseconflictsamong nterpretativechemes aremoralandstruc-turalstrugglesover culturalandsocialresources,not over truths-no matterhowmanygenu-flections to scientific orGod-giventrutharemade on all sides of the conflict(Smelser 1963).

Ideology is local because it arises in relation to the cultural and structuralconditionsimmediately facing groups. However, not all groups experience and interpretthe samecircumstancessimilarly.The resultis that there s never a single ideology expressed amongmovement and countermovementgroups.Instead,varyingideologicalversions arise out ofthe differentways in which local circumstancesare made relevant to groups'interests andtheirexperiences (Schegloff 1991; Platt and Fraser1998).

Ideologies serve cognitive functions because they involve the creationof meaningfulconceptions and practices appropriate o the immediate conditions. Also embedded inideology's cognitive meaningsareprinciples regardingemotionalexpression and control.Ideology links cognitive expressionsto emotive ones by interpretingandcontainingemo-tions about local circumstances while providing hope for institutingan idealized past,present,and future.Ideology provides for its adherentsdefinitionsof "appropriate"mo-tions regarding he crisis circumstances,courses of actionpursued,and future states (Platt1980). Ideology also offers its adherentsmorallegitimacy for courses of action, insistingthey will achieve greatercommon or public good in the ideal state (Williams 1995).Within the distinctionprovided by JorgeLarrain 1996:53-54), ourconceptionof ide-ology incorporatesboth "neutral"particularized)and"critical" evaluative)definitions ofideology's functions. Weadopta "neutral"onceptionin that we recognizethe mobilizingcapacities of the particularperspectivesof all ideological symbolic formulations, herebyrejecting any division between truthfuland ideologically distortedunderstandingsof thesocial world. We offer a "critical" definition by calling attention to the interest-basednatureof ideology by examiningits role in criticizing social arrangementsandjustifyingsocial movements for change andresistance.We conclude that ideology is a symbolic perspective regardingdesired social condi-tions; it is an assemblage of ideas about the constructionof activities and circumstancesoriented to achieve interests and life experiences as these are visualized in an idealizedpast, present, and future. Ideology is a structurallygroundedlocal construction. It isexpressed in language discourse that orients moral, cognitive, and emotive processesrespondingto and interpreting he experiences of failures and absences of cultural doc-trine and structural circumstances. It mobilizes adherents to resolve these failures andabsences, therebysetting themin motionto establish or reestablishidealized conceptionsof past, present, andfuture social conditions.

IDEOLOGYAS A SOCIOLINGUISTICPROCESSIdeology is expressed primarilyin spoken and writtenlanguage.We employ a sociolin-guistic analysis to investigate how its meanings are signified in language use (Gumperz1982). We also investigate how ideological language differentiates-that is, how it isparticularized o adherents'circumstances(Gamson 1992).

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SOCIOLOGICALTHEORYA society's culture may be conceived of as its total symbol discourse regardingtheconstitution of meanings(Williams 1977). Culture so understood s the symbolic contextwithin which ideologies are constructed.The ideologies we examine were constructedwithin the contexts of local circumstances, ncludingthe southernsegregationistculture.

Racial segregationis a salient element of Americansociety generally,andit was an espe-cially coherent southern subculture.It was a significantcultural-symboliccontext duringthe civil rightsera.The ideological expressions we discovered were constructed within this culturalcon-text. In these conditions,conducive to the developmentof social movements,a varietyofideological interpretations rose (Hunt 1991). Ideological languageinfluencedby the his-tory, experiences, interests, and structuraland cultural circumstances of segregationistadherents resulted in varying ideological conceptions (Schutz 1962; Platt and Williams1988).A sociolinguisticanalysisof the interpretative rocesses involved in creatingmobi-lizing ideologies provides insightsinto the ways in which alternate egregationist deolog-ical expressions were constructed.Ideological sentences used to make immediatecircumstancesmeaningfulare referredto as "indexical"expressions. Referringto an expressionas "indexical"calls attentiontothe inherentambiguity existing in everyday language, requiring,in speech, the use ofdiscourse strategiesto express andacquirethe intendedmeaningof these sentences (Bar-Hillel 1954; Peirce 1931; Wittgenstein 1958). As is the case in all everyday languageconversations, the meanings of ideological sentences are achieved by using discoursestrategies.Discourse strategiesare conversational nterpretivepractices.There are two forms ofdiscourse strategies.One form is grammatical,semantic,and syntacticinterpretivestrat-egies: that s, interpretive trategiesembedded n the sentences themselves that are usedbyspeakersto expressandby hearers o comprehend entences'meanings.These arereferredto as linguistic interpretivestrategiesbecause they are expressed in and restrictedto thesentences.They reveal theirmeaningsin textualanalysesof spokenand writtensentences.The second interpretive orm thatspeakersemploy to assist themin providing meaningtoeveryday languagesentences is referred o as extralinguisticorpragmaticdiscourse strat-egies. These are interpretationsdrawn from the interactional eatures that exist betweenspeakers, such as facial and tonal expressions, sharedhistorical and experientialback-grounds,and sharedculturaland structural ircumstances n which conversationsarecon-ducted.These arerevealedin contextualanalysesof languageuse. Sociolinguisticanalysisrelateseveryday language use to the circumstancesof its production.Language compre-hension and the capacityto sharemeaningsrequire he use of both linguisticand extralin-guistic discourse strategies. In interpersonal nteractive settings, the comprehensionoflanguageis especially influencedby the use of extralinguistic,pragmaticdiscourse strat-egies (Gumperz1982).Sociolinguistic analysis assumes that shared communicationis accomplished amonginteractingspeakers within the context of their settings. Background experiences pluscontext are the local extralinguistic eaturesthat are used as pragmaticdiscoursestrategiesto achieve sharedmeanings.The communicantsmust know the purpose,occasion, partici-pants,and what is relevant to each other in order to achieve meaningfulcommunication.Languagein and of itself cannotconvey sharedmeanings;it must be placed in contexttobe interpreted orrectly.Sharedmeaningsin ideological language,as in all languagedis-courses, arecontext-dependent.Meaningfully shared communication can be achieved using everyday language sen-tences when speakersuse similarlinguistic andextralinguisticdiscoursestrategies.Evenjargon, idiomatic, or particularlyambiguoussentences can be understood when they are

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IDEOLOGICALLANGUAGEAND SOCIAL MOVEMENTMOBILIZATIONused among personswho sharesimilarhistories,cultures,andsituations.However,despitethe capacity to achieve sharedmeanings in spoken or writtenlanguage, ideological dis-course is particularlysusceptible to particularizinginfluences because of the circum-stances in which it occurs. Ideological discourse occurs understructurallyand culturallydisruptedconditions-that is, when cultureprinciplesarefailing orabsent,or as Marx andMcAdamputit, when culture s "inadequate,ndifferentor in dispute" Marxand McAdam1994:18). Sense-makingcrises underminethe use of shared discourse strategies, makingcommonly interpreted deological meanings difficult. It must be emphasized, however,thatthe use of extralinguisticpragmaticdiscoursestrategiesto develop shared deologicalinterpretationsunder these conditions does not merely become difficult; they are oftenintentionallymade difficult.Movementleadersattempt o fomentcrises, therebymobilizing participation.Theyalsoknowingly assertdivergent nformation o differentgroupsto encouragethemto constructalternatebutcircumstantiallyrelevantideologies in orderto mobilize them. We arguethatleadersemploy linguisticandpragmaticdiscoursestrategies n their efforts to characterizecrisis circumstancesas relevant to differentgroupswho may share a cultural worldview(Childers 1990).The degree to which the interpretiveuses of discourse strategiesenhanceor differenti-ate sharedideological meaningsbetween leadersandparticipants s, of course, an empir-ical question. We examine the constructionof both shared and differentiated deologicalmeanings. We emphasize the latter because it is the alternateideological versions thatillustrateour contentionthat ideology's power resides in its capacity to mobilize diversegroupswith diverse ideological outlooks into a single movement.Ourdatawill emphasizetheparticularizing ffects of linguisticandextralinguisticstrat-egies as these are used to highlightdifferentfeaturesof the segregationistworldview.Theywill also be used to illustrate the inclusion of exogamous principlesand ideas in particu-larizing ideological versions. Featuresfrom the segregationistworldview and other cul-tural doctrinewere used as the groundsfor constructing deological interpretations mongvariously situatedsegregationist correspondents.Alternate,and sometimescontending, deological perspectives appearbecause differentgroupsareencouragedto perceive crisis circumstances n distinctways. Adherents' nter-pretationsvaried because of the differences in theirconceptionsof the culturalandstruc-tural circumstancesthey confronted,their distinct knowledge of the crisis circumstanceandits potential impactupon theirinterests,theirformulationsregardingopportunitiesorobstacles to act, andso forth (McAdam,McCarthy,and Zald 1996). On the bases of suchvaried local knowledge and circumstances,differentgroupscalculate and derive distinctideologies and courses of action.The processes of particularizing deological constructionsmay be furtherspecified.Ideological constructionsare accomplishedin two ways. First, groupsin different socialcircumstanceswith distinct backgroundsmnaynterpretthe same cultural worldviewdif-ferently (as, e.g., the class- and status-influEnceddeological differencesexpressed amongmovement adherentsin Robert White's 1989 study of the IRA). Activists with varyingbackgroundknowledge, experiences, and circumstancesmay employ different extralin-guistic discourse strategies to make sense of the crisis and a shared cultural worldview.These result in particularized deological discourses with a variety of ideological lan-guages.This occurs-and can be historicallydemonstratedo have occurred-even amongpeople who express solidarity with one another.Ideological interpretationsmay sharesome perspectives and may overlap in substance but nevertheless be distinct versions ofthe same cultural worldview adheredto by variously structurally ituatedgroupspartici-patingin a single movementorganization(Kertzer 1988; Platt and Fraser1998).

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SOCIOLOGICALTHEORYSecond, different groups of people contextualize different substantive aspects of aworldview-those aspects relevantto their interestsand experiences. In responseto his-torical and structural ircumstances, hey mayalso "goafield" to findrelevantexogamousideas and principles in cultural doctrine otherthanthat which is expressed in a cultural

worldview.Historicaland structural ircumstancesmay encouragethem to generatenewideas thatthey annex to theirideological constructions.In these instances,they assimilatethe "foreign"or newly created ideas, integratingthem into an ideological constructionderivedfrom a culturalworldview.This second form of ideological constructioncentersdifferent substantiveaspects of a worldview and ideas previously not associated with it.This process, too, creates alternate deological versions.However,this formof ideologicalparticularizingoften results in conflict and schisms amonggroupswho share similarout-looks. Ithas a tendencyto splinterorganizations xisting within a "social-movementndus-try"(SMI; see McCarthyandZald 1977; Benford 1993).The firstform of ideological variationoccurs becausedifferentmeaningsare attributedto similar worldview substance. The second form of variationoccurs because groups ofpersons are creatinginnovative ideological discourses in relation to historical-structuralcircumstances.Both forms of ideological variationwere foundamongthe segregationists'correspondencewe analyzed.Bothforms of interpretivevariationarelegitimatedon the bases of interestsas these aredrawnfrom perceived relevantsocial, structural, ultural,and immediate circumstances.Each of the different deologicalconstructions s deemed"rational,"n thatactivistsimputethatthe ideological discoursesuggests reasonablysuccessful courses of action in the pur-suit of changeorresistance.Suchideological formulationsare made resonantby providingideological adherentswith moral,cognitive, and emotive expressions appropriateo theirlocally experiencedcircumstances.Ideology languagemay mobilize differentsegmentsof activists to participate n differ-entorganizations,creatinga varietyof mobilizedgroupswithin a single SMI.Ideologycanalso be used to interpretstructuralconditions similarly for different groups of persons(e.g., those of differentraces,classes, genders), bindingthemin solidaritywithinthe samemovementorganization.Putotherwise,it is importanto recognizethat deology can mobi-lize differentsegments of society with varyingstructuralnterests,each groupwith over-lappingyet distinct deologicaloutlooks,to participaten a single organization.This occursnot because ideology unifies meanings,but ratherbecause ideology can differentiate tocreatemobilizingjustificationsfor a varietyof groups.

Ideology's flexible capacityto achieve these ends is essential to the creation of massmovements. Mobilizing a variety of groups with diverse backgroundsand interests toengage in the same mass movementdependsupon shared,yet varying, interpretivecon-structionsof ideological language(Childers1990).A DATASET FOR A SOCIOLINGUISTICANALYSIS OF IDEOLOGYThe civil rightsmovementcreateda crisis for the southernsegregationistworldview. Mar-tin LutherKing, Jr.received letters from segregationists interpreting heir failing world-view and wishing to educate him about segregation'svalue for such things as "law andorder"and "Black andWhiterelations."These correspondentswere attempting o open adialoguewith King to convince him of the incorrectnessof his doctrinalpositions and thecorrectnessof theirs,hopingto convince him to end his integrationcampaigns. AlthoughKing did respondto manywho wroteto him, he did notrespondto segregationists' etters.We analyzethese letters to demonstrate he empiricalvalue of ourconceptionof ideol-ogy. The letters sharemany commonly held beliefs, yet at the same time the correspon-

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IDEOLOGICALLANGUAGEAND SOCIALMOVEMENTMOBILIZATIONdents constructeddistinct ideologies. The substanceof the letters exhibits segregationistideologicalconceptionsand the discoursestrategies heauthorsused to interpret ndtherebyto constructparticularizeddeological formulations.The discoursestrategiesin the lettersare foundin theauthors'uses of languageand in the structural, ultural,andcircumstantialfeaturesupon which they remark.From the discoursestrategiesin theirletters,we derivetheirinterpretations f King and the civil rightsmovement and the structural, ultural,andcircumstantial nfluences they used to create theirideological conceptions.The letters were discoveredin thelibraryand archiveof the MartinLutherKing,Jr.Cen-ter for Nonviolent Social Changein Atlanta,Georgia.The archive contains a large deposi-toryof letters sent to Dr.KingandtheSCLCduringtheyearsof the civil rightsmovement.Thecorrespondencencludes letters from movementsupportersandopponents.The segre-gationistletterswerefrequentlymarkedby SCLCstaff as "adverse" etters.The intentof thestaff was to signify a broadrangeof antimovementsentiment.However,not all the disap-provingletters in the Kingarchive were so marked.We used the SCLC'sreference to "ad-verse" as our initial conceptionof ideological resistanceto the civil rightsmovement. TheKingarchiveof documentsand etters s divided intotwo series,"primary"nd"secondary."Theprimaryseries containletterswrittenby well-knownpeople such as PresidentLyndonJohnsonorAndrewYoung; hesecondaryseries containcorrespondence romordinarypeo-ple. Forouranalysis, letters foundin the secondaryseries were most appropriate.Thesecondaryseriescontains a wide varietyof letters.We did aninitial,cursoryreadingof all the letters held in this series.Afterselecting andphotocopying,two sampleswere de-veloped: antimovement etters (i.e., letters marked "adverse"or expressing similar senti-ments)andsupportiveetters lettersmarkedbythe SCLCstaffas "kind" rexpressing upportandparticipationnthemovement).7Thereare900 adverse etters.Thesamplefor thisanaly-sis is drawn romthese. In addition orequiring hatanalyzed ettersexpressresistance o in-tegration,we used thefollowing criteria o select letters foranalysis.First,we required hatthe letters be legible. Second, we selected lettersthat contained informationabout the cor-respondents'background, uch as theirrace,gender,placeof residence,andreasonsfor writ-ingDr.King;whilesomeadversecorrespondents resentedhis nformation bout hemselves,a greatmanydid not.Third, ettersin the samplehad to providedetailed informationaboutthecorrespondents'attitudes owardanddescriptionsof the movement and its doctrine, n-tegration,AfricanAmericans,Dr.King,Americansociety, its values, and much more.These criteriaresultedin a sample composed of letters with considerable informationabout the writers' ideological stances but unsystematic information about their back-grounds.Approximately5 percentof the adverse etters were from AfricanAmericans.Forthis analysis we selected lettersexclusively from white correspondents.Ouranalysis stresses the authors'purposesfor writingand the cultural, structural,andcircumstantialegitimations they used tojustify the continuedseparationof the races. Theletters revealed the practicalcircumstances of the letter writers, their threatenedreality,and their ideological realities. The correspondentswere telling King which of their cul-tural, structural,andimmediateexperientialcircumstanceswere salient to them. These inturn shapedtheir ideological formulations. The contents of these letters conform to ourdefinition of ideology.

Applyinga SociolinguisticAnalysis of IdeologyWe begin this analysis by discerning what is commonly shared in the segregationists'cultural outlook. We derive this by drawing upon two sources: the total sample of segre-7A more detailed descriptionof the archive and the acquisitionof the letters is presentedin Platt and Fraser(1998).

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SOCIOLOGICALTHEORYgationists'letters to Dr. King, and the segregationistcultural raditionas it is expressedinpublished iterature rom the JimCrowperiod, includingtheWCC'sresponsesto activitiesof the civil rightsmovement. Wepursuethis analysisby examininghow the segregationistcultureis particularized n the correspondents' deological accounts. We discovered thatthe correspondents' ormulationsof their structural, ultural,and immediateexperientialcircumstanceswere used as discoursestrategiesto constructand differentiate heirpartic-ularized versions of the segregationistculturalworldview.8Weuse writing etters to KingandSCLCas theoperationaldefinition of support or andparticipationin the countermovementagainst civil rights. Given the images of sign-carrying picketers, lunch-countersit-ins, and vigilante violence against demonstrators,letter-writingeems agenerousdefinitionof supportandparticipation.However,we believeit is justified. First,we are interested n the spokenand writtenlanguageof ideology, andtheletterscomprisea gold mine of theseforms of informationaboutsegregationists'beliefs.Second, we are theoretically guided by the importanceof participants' ormulationsofmovement ideology, and the letters provide an entirely different source of articulationsfrom the pronouncementsof organizationalleaders and spokespersons, the distinctionreferred to as "formal" n contrast to "operational" deologies (Williams and Blackburn1996).Wenote, too, that the numberof citizens who engage in anykindof politicalactionother than voting is small (Neuman [1986] estimates 5 percentof the adultpopulation).Letter-writing tself is a motivated action that is relatively uncommon.Further,becausethese letters were cognitive, emotive, and moralizingattemptsto educate and persuadeKingabout the values of segregation,we consider them a significantsource of informationon the ideological stances of countermovementparticipantsandsupporters.Finally,whatis absolutely apparent s that the letter writers were formulating deologies in reactiontothe crisis circumstances acing segregationist society.In face-to-face conversationalsettings, meaningsareachievedby interpretinga varietyof linguistic and extralinguistic-auditory, tonal, and visual-cues. In writtenlanguage,these extralinguisticcues are unavailable.Thus, interpretingwrittenlanguage requiresamodified form of sociolinguistic analysis. Ourapproachmakes severalassumptionsaboutcreatingand acquiring meanings in writtenlanguage.First, the segregationistcorrespon-dents were engagedin constructingandconveying to Kingtheircircumstantiallynformedconceptions of a southern cultural worldview. Second, the meanings they conveyed areexplicitly and implicitly embeddedin the substance of their correspondence.Third,thelinguistic andextralinguisticdiscoursestrategies they employedreveal the meanings theyintendedto convey. Fourth,because this is an analysisof written anguage,extralinguisticdiscourse strategiesplay a significantrole in shapingthe correspondents'deological for-mulations. Fifth, the extralinguistic strategies were derived from aspects of correspon-dents'lives-that is, their nterestsand the relevant eaturesof their circumstances.Finally,the interests and relevantfeatures used as extralinguisticdiscoursestrategiesto constructideological versions of the southern cultural worldview made the versions authenticallymeaningfuland resonant to correspondents'structural,cultural,and immediate circum-stances. We insist that the circumstances the correspondentsuse as extralinguisticstrat-

8A "culturalworldview" s a subcultureof a society's culture.We think of a worldview as appliedto a domain-specific set of symbolic meanings,such as ethnic, racial,gender,andgeographicworldviews. The segregationistworldviewevolved and was elaborated romassumptionsderived from "the naturalorderof segregation." t wasand is a subculture hat has much to say aboutblacks and whites and their relationswith one another.It is notmutebut has muchless to say about,forexample, the value of capitalism, democracy,and other such institutionalactivities. By contrast,a society's cultureis a metanarrative, rovidingfor all mannerof meaningconstructionsand practicalcourses of action pursuedwithin a society. Ourpoint is thatthe segregationistcultural worldviewmust be differentiatedand translatedby movement participants nto their "operative deology" (Williams andBlackburn1996).

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IDEOLOGICALLANGUAGEAND SOCIALMOVEMENTMOBILIZATIONegies cannotbe assumedaprioribut nsteadmustbe discovered ntheletters' exts(Schegloff1991:49-57). In ouranalyses, we ask what these featuresare,how andin whatways theyact as extralinguisticdiscourse strategies,andhow they influence the constructionof theauthors' deological conceptions of the southernculturalworldview.TheNatural Orderof Segregation:A SouthernSegregationistCulturalWorldviewMcMillenpointsoutthat heWCC, hepremier ountermovementrganization, everachievedideological consensus. However,he claims thereexisted "acommonbody of assumptionsgenerallyacceptableto the entire movement."He indicates that"Primarily he ideology ofthe Citizens'Council was the ideology of white supremacy."Further, upremacists

rested theircase for white dominanceon the postulatethatNegroes were inherentlydifferent from Caucasiansand that this difference, this hereditary nferiority,ren-dered them unsuitablefor free associationwith white society. In the Council's viewthe black man's presence could be toleratedonly so long as the range of his eco-nomic, political, andsocial interactionwith the white man'sworldcould be system-atically defined. In the Council's syllogism of white supremacy,then, segregationwas the conclusion that necessarily followed the premise thathuman worth is cal-culable in termsof apparentphysical characteristics. McMillen 1971:161)The segregationistcultural worldview created the moral andpracticalreality insistingupon the separationof races, the sharedcultural"bedrock" rom which differentiated de-ologies were constructed.This doctrine,describedin the literature Myrdalwith Sternerand Rose 1944;Dailey 1962;Kilpatrick1962;Newby 1968;McMillen 1971) andexpressed

in the adverseletters,suggests a formulation hatmay be referred o as "the natural orderof segregation."Over the years of Jim Crow, and duringthe period of the civil rights movement, thefeaturesof the naturalorder of segregationevolved, andyet the center of its formulationwas buttressedby thesame foundationalassumptions.Bothanti- andprosegregation uthorssuggest thatforAmericansociety generally,and for southernwhites in particular, ace is atranscendent act of social life requiringspecial norms of conduct. Assumed hereditaryinferiorityof blacks-ordained by Godor validatedby "science"-initially justified slav-ery, andsubsequentto Reconstruction t underwrote he moral andpractical separationofthe races as these were instituted in the myriadforms of legal and informal Jim Crowstructures.Fixed as it was in inheritance,blacks'inferioritywas immuneto environmentalinfluences. This createdpermanentcircumstancesof incompatibilitybetween blacks andwhites, justifying racial separationandallocatingblacks to lesser statusand second-classcitizenship. It is also assumedthat these conditionsserve the interestsof bothwhites andblacks,as each race is distributed o societal roles consistent with its inherited ntelligence,personal attributes,and ordained destiny. Thus, the prohibitions against intermarriage,physicalcontact,socializing,andpoliticalandeconomicequalityareconsistentwithhered-ity, serving both races' interests. Having found their appropriateplaces in society, bothraces should be content in this division of labor.There is also a not-too-subtlesubtext,encapsulatedin Mary Douglas's (1970) formulation of pollution taboos. Segregationistcultureproposesthe idealized-mythologicalbelief thatwhites aretherepositoriesof puritywhile blacks are objects of danger, and that the natural order of segregation prohibitscontactpreventingracialpollution.9

90f course,this was a normative abooservingwhite male interests-for example, in the sexual exploitationofblack women.

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SOCIOLOGICALTHEORYBelow, we describe four distinct ideological versions of the naturalorder of segrega-tion. Each version shares some of the features of "natural rderof segregation"culturebutsimultaneously ashions for its own intereststhe assumptionsof the southernsegregation-ist culturalworldview.Thefourversionsreflectcorrespondents'uses of theirown relevant

cultures, structures,andcircumstances,expressedin the letters as extralinguisticdiscoursestrategies, shaping the authors' ideological version of the worldview. Among the foursegregationist deologies we describe,the first two envision the worldviewas underattackand failing in its capacity to organize social arrangements.When adjustedto the corre-spondents'situations,these two versions closely advocate the traditional eatures of thesouthern culturalworldview; thus, they are more or less "restorationist."The other twoideological forms assume thatthe segregationistworldview is missing prescriptionsnec-essary to bringabout social order within the context of post-WorldWarIIAmerica;theseversions innovateuponthe segregationistworldview.However,it is axiomaticfor all four versions-and within the assumptionof the naturalorderof segregation-that the social worldis appropriately rdered.Segregation s simplya partof that order.Taken-for-grantedoutinesandculturally egitimatedsocial practicesare seen as operating n everyone's interestby ensuringorder.Concomitantly,overt vio-lence is disruptiveand presumablycontraryto order.However, given that segregationispartand parcelof the extantorder,violence associated with the civil rightsmovement iseasily assignedto those who arecalling for change.Compliancewith law implies fidelityboth to God's and humanlaw; such obedience is less a definition of order thanit is con-sideredintegralto themaintenanceof order.Whether he maintenanceof orderemergesasan end in itself is differentiatedamongthe variousideological versions.The more funda-mental point is that the basic naturalness of order is the result of coherence among atranscendent eitherreligiously or "scientifically" egitimated) design, the organizationofAmericansociety in bothits historyandpresent,and the naturalworld. These thingssharea "createdness" n which each realmreinforcesthe other.This formulation resonates with Geertz's (1973) descriptionof the meaning-creatingfunctions of culture, in which a worldview unites a cosmology with humansociety andeach borrowsauthority romthe other tonormalizeandintegrate hatworldview.This doesnot require,of course, logically consistent argumentswithin the articulated defenses ofsegregation.Much of this is unexaminedand often unarticulated;t representsan assump-tion of order n which the sub-rosaqualityitself lends it its power.In similarterms,Larrain(1979) understands deology as playing the "naturalizing"unction of aligning a moralvision of what the world ideally should be with an empiricalvision of how the world is.The rough edges of the latterareassimilated to the former,therebycreatingin the believ-er's mind a satisfyingcorrespondencebetween the two. Whenbelievers cannotaccomplishthis correspondence, his is anotherway of referringto a sense-makingcrisis, the socialorderingof crisis and culturalfailure, and the failure and absence of organizingculturalprinciples.The fourideological versionsderived from the naturalnessof the segregationistculturalworldview are alternativesstruggling to accomplish the alignment while attemptingtoreinstateand/or reconfigurea segregationistorder.Each differentiatesthe source of thenaturalnessandjustifies the continuing separationof the races on the basis of the corre-spondents'circumstancesandinterests,whichtheythemselves understand s relevant.Thefour ideological alternativesare: (1) a religiously based constructionemphasizingas anextralinguisticdiscoursestrategythe divine source andreligiousjustificationfor segrega-tion; (2) an historical-"scientific"-grounded onstruction hathighlightsrelevantimputedtraditionalarrangementsn Americansocial life and an alleged biologically groundednat-uralorderof inequalities;(3) a secular-politicalconstruction hatemploys as extralinguis-

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IDEOLOGICALLANGUAGEAND SOCIALMOVEMENTMOBILIZATIONtic discourse strategies the free enterprise system, national security, and the dangersofcommunism;and (4) a symbolicconstructionderived from the culturalvalues of equalityand individualismacting as discourse strategiesanddisclaimingAfrican Americans'pre-parednessin termsof these to achieve these circumstances.10

Religious Constructionof Segregation: Segregationas God's WillIn the religious ideological constructionof the segregationistworldview,separationof theraces is a markof God'splanforhumankind-importantly,a direct reflection of the sacredorder n the naturalworld. The extralinguisticdiscoursestrategyused to create this versionis found in the knowledge, sometimes accurateand sometimes paraphrased, f the Scrip-tures. This emphasis on Scripture s consistent with the thrust of Evangelical Protestantculture, in which religious authorityis uniquely groundedin the Bible. The language,therefore, locates the justification for segregation in a divine will that created separatespecies andraces and a religious doctrine that insists upon their continuedseparation.Atypical example:

Turn to Genesis 1stChapterin the King James Holy Bible and you will see Godcreated the fish, the birds,animals,also man ... aftertheir own kind.... Youdon'tsee a black bird integratingwith a Robin, etc.... God was displeased with thechildren of Israel when they intermarried,Even with other nations and tribes, seeExodus 34, 10 to 17 The Covenant or Law of Segregation.Oragain:

Do you ever tell yourpeople you are a cursedpeople notby the man in the South butyourEarthlyFatherBro. Noah, who cursedyou and do you tell your people thattheyare also bornin Bondagefor as long as the worldstands? .. as for segregation,yourememberbackin the Bible where Nimrod who was a blackmanand he was havingthe tower of Babel built... Now at the tower of Babel God separatedall nations. ..Here the writer is depending uponthe assumed sharedbackgroundknowledge of the bib-lical story in which Noah's son Ham sees his father naked and is cursed. A commonunderstandingamong many AmericanChristianswas that the "curseof Ham"was darkskin. The letterwriter s pointingout to King thatGod'swill (anddirectintervention),notsouthern whites' racism, is the source of segregation practices.Anotherletter makes theconnection specific:

I Don't Think YouWould WantToTrace YourAncestryBack to Cane Do You,thenaftertheFlood Because HamMade Lite of His FatherHis Son Had a CursePutuponHim YouCanLearnaboutthe Flood in Genesis Six Chapter...Many of the adverse letters are replete with references to God, the church,religion,"Christian" onduct,and the like, but are not necessarily includedin this ideological ver-

sion. What makes this construction distinct is its reliance on theological doctrine as thepragmaticstrategyfor extractingfromthe culturalworldview thejustificationof segrega-tion in a divine plan. For these correspondents, he orderingof the segregatedworld isl?Inthis instance,we use the term"symbolic"as it is derived from Kinderand Sear's (1981) idea of "symbolicracism."

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SOCIOLOGICALTHEORYeasily apparent;a number of their letters refer to "black birds not mating with whitebirds."

Onemustonly be attentive o God'struth,as revealedin Scripture, n order o recognizethe rightnessand universalityof segregation.For example, althoughthe following lettermakes references to communism, it is understood as sin; divine justification is at issuehere:

[P]rove to me thatGod teaches Race mixing, any where in the Bible... If you willstop and think a few momentsyou will be able to see the greatsin of CommunismandraceAgitationin this country. .. [Those] tryingto force racemixing will neverenterHeaven-if you want Bible proof for thatstatement,I have it.

A writersums up the religious constructionof segregationsuccinctly: "SEGREGATIONIS GOD'S PLAN. INTEGRATION S MAN'S PLAN. And we realize we should OBEYGOD RATHERTHA[N] MAN." In the religious construction,we specifically do notinclude statementsthat criticized King for not acting like a Christian,or thatencouragedhim to payattention o his preachingandsavingsouls. Referencesto religionas culturalorsocial practicesare found in the second ideological discourse, the historical-"scientific"ideology.Historical Practices, TraditionalSocial Arrangements,"Scientifically"Based InequalityThe historical constructionemploys knowledge of traditionas the extralinguisticbase tointerpretandalign the segregationistworldview.Segregation s justified as a naturalorderbecause it was traditionally nstituted. Lettersin this constructioncriticize King for dis-ruptingwell-established,historicallylegitimatedpractices.This ideological version is alsojustified in terms of an essential inegalitarianismbased in the alleged biological incom-patibilityof blacks and whites. The source of inequalityis made explicit by referringtoestablishedpractices,orby referenceto thepastasjustificationforfuturepractices.Racialdifferencesand racialseparationarepartof a natural,established,historical,cosmologicalordergrounded n the alleged biological inferiorityof blacks.Correspondentspointto thebenefits to AfricanAmericans of this naturallysegregatedorder(although he benefits arealleged rather hanspecified). The bedrock of these practicesexists in the sexual segrega-tion of blacks andwhites, the transgressionof which results in miscegenationandpresum-ably in the polluting of the races. Although God and religion may be mentionedin theletters,this ideological versionis shornof theologicaljustification.Forexample,one letterwritersays:

God andwhite men andwomen madeAmerica,its culture and traditionswith brainsandcourage, with valor and patriotismby fighting, sufferingand dying andevery-thing in it was conceived developed over the centuriesby WHITEpeople-negroeshad nothingto do with its evolution, its progressor its greatness,yet you negroesthinkyou can step in and claim "rights"which do not exist ...

Within this circularreasoning, biological differences arejustified by social practicesorby"scientific facts" thatlegitimatethis ideological interpretation, ut not by a divinely man-datedplan:1 Unsurprisingly, his construction s expressed in the publishedliterature n Reverend Louis E. Dailey's TheSin or Evils of Integration(1962:15-23).

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IDEOLOGICALLANGUAGEAND SOCIALMOVEMENTMOBILIZATIONBiological differences do exist between the races. There are inborn racial antago-nisms. It is not merely prejudice. Perhapsthere should be a better name for it, orperhapsthere should be a distinction between emotional prejudiceand intelligentprejudice.Whatevert is, it cannotbechanged,and s onlyintensifiedby your program.Thatsegregationis naturaland immutable s often combined with an implicitnotion ofterritorialityabout a historically justified white ownershipof America (nowhere in thisformulation s thererecognitionof Native Americans' relation to the land priorto whitesettlers).Not surprisingly, his resultsin a "return o Africa" solution to racialantagonism.Some of the correspondentsuse angry languagethat conflatesAfrica, thejungle, the pre-sumed animal natureof blackpeople, and a lack of civilization. This is commonenoughasan epithet, andmany of the referenceshave a formulaicquality.But otherinterpretationsof this ideological version of segregation recognize an inevitabilityof separationof theraces anddo not view the return o Africa as punishment,but as a restorationof the natural

order.Thecorrespondentnotedbelow uses linguisticas well as extralinguisticstrategiestoproffer"a return o Africa"policy. A semanticinterpretation f the phrase"tobuy out theNegroes" requiresknowledgeof slaverywhile moreimmediatelysuggestinganinstrumen-tal formulationof "tobuy off" to restore the traditionalgood orderof the separationof theraces benefitingboth peoples.The two races are not happywhenforced together.Never were & never will be. Theright way to correct the whole troubleis for this Nation to buy out the Negroes &give them all free transportation ack to Africa, the land thatproducedthem in thefirstplace. See to it thatthey have a nation of theirown to operateto suit themselves.Then both races will be happy.Some letters cite AbrahamLincoln as an authority or a back-to-Africaplan.This sug-

gestion is occasionally punctuatedwith allusions to the inheritedincompatibilityof theraces. These correspondentsdisputeKing'suse of Lincoln as a symbolfor his struggleandinstead cite Lincoln's prepresidentialproposalfor separatism.Lincoln's importanceandlegitimate authorityare not questioned;in thatregard,his image is part of the extralin-guistic strategyused here.Whatis at issue is the proper nterpretation f his thought.Thisis expressed in the following:

[Neither]Mr. L. (norI) believe in slavery,but neitherof us want close association ofwhite and black peoples. The negro race is far inferiorto the white race.... Whydon't you quoteMr. Lincoln on the following partof a debatespeech [followed by aquote advocatingseparatism].There is a common admonishment or King to "getback to preaching he Gospel."Oneletterbegins, "You set yourself up as a minister of the Gospel, then why, I challenge you,don'tyou live it???"Interestingly, he reasonfor the admonishmentvaries. For some letterwriters,it is thejob of the clergy to preparebelievers for an other-worldlysalvation,andthus the civil rights campaigns are out of King's institutionally legitimate jurisdiction.Otherwritersdoubt King's understandingof politics or economics, given his trainingintheology.Yet others accuse him of hubrisandarrogance n criticizing society and call hima "self-appointed"eaderunrepresentative f themany "good negroes" n theUnitedStates.Whateverthe rationale,the natural orderand history of segregationare taken as given.This formulation, ike the religious one, uses correspondents'backgroundknowledge and

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SOCIOLOGICALTHEORYsocial structural ircumstances n a segregated society to realignthe segregationistideol-ogy with the changingsocietal conditions.Further,we note the "assembled" haracterof theparticularizeddeological versionsofsegregationby combiningwithin this version both defenses of traditionalhistoricalprac-tices and "scientific"(that s, pseudoscientific) ustifications.Formany scholarly analysts,tradition,history, and culture are understoodas human constructions,while science isthoughtof as a legitimatingdiscourse thattranscendshumancreation.In that sense, sci-ence is like religion in that it is an authority beyond human society (see Jasper 1992).However, the religious version of segregation doctrine is clearly theological in itsorientation-that is, focused on the manifestationsof a conscious divine will-while thehistorical-"scientific" onstruction s predicatedon the idea thatthe cultureand traditionsof segregation are part of a naturalorder that can also be understoodthroughscience.Logical coherence is not the ideological glue; rather, t is the interpretiveworkthatmakesthe segregationistworldview resonant with local circumstancesandthe perceivedhistor-ical relevance to the correspondents.Secular-Political Constructionand the Threatof CommunismThe two previousconstructions of segregationist ideology conceive of the southernseg-regationistworldview as providinglegitimatecourses of action but failing to achieve itsintendedpurposeof producingand maintainingthe natural order of segregation.Thesedifferentiated deological forms offer repair,specification,and reaffirmationof the segre-gationist worldview. The worldview was failing in the face of social change, and letterwriterswereproducing dealized,if notmythologized,affirmationsof theirversions of thenaturalorder.In contrast,the ideological versions discussed here and in the next sectionconsider the segregationistworldview as missing important actual and prescriptiveele-ments in theirconstructionsof the naturalorder.

Thefirst of these includes asextralinguisticdiscoursestrategies hreatsof communism othe United Statesand to the free-enterprise ystemformulatedas they areintertwinedwithsegregation.These threatswere notpartof 19th-century imCrowculture,butwererelevantto the postwarworld and Cold Warculture.Althoughcommunism was immediatelyasso-ciated with civil-rights-movementactivities, it did not have a prominentplace in the con-structionof thereligiousor historical-"scientific"deologicalversions of the segregationistculturalworldview.Communismand reeenterprisewereassimilated othenatural-orderor-mulationby assumingthatsegregationwas integrally nvolved with the historicalevolutionof Americansociety intoa world-dominant oliticaland economic nation.Since integrationand communism are conflated in this ideological version,criticisms of segregationare as-sociated with an attackuponAmerica'spresentand futuregreatness.2Thepragmaticbasis of interpretationn the secular-politicalideological construction sa particularizedhistoricalconceptionthat intertwinesAmerica'sgreatnesswith the sepa-rationof the races. However, implied in this ideological version is the belief that if inte-grationdoctrine were shorn of the communist attackuponAmerica,equalitybetween theraces mightbe possible.The second version, which we discuss in the next section, also includes importantfactualandprescriptiveelements that were not originallypartof the southernsegregation-ist worldview.We refer to it as the symbolicideological constructionof racialseparation.

'2It has been suggested that J. EdgarHoover initiated the association of black activism with radicalismandcommunism. Hoover was militantlyantiblack and anticommunist.These animosities were conflated and firstdirected at Marcus Garvey, whom he considered a dangerousblack radical. By "1919, Hoover had alreadydefined political movements within the black communityas a permanent ield of investigationfor his RadicalDivision" (Powers 1987:127-28).

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IDEOLOGICALLANGUAGEAND SOCIAL MOVEMENTMOBILIZATIONThis version involves the inclusionof theculturalvaluesof equalityand individualachieve-ment as the extralinguistic,pragmaticbases for interpreting he perpetuationof the sepa-ration of the races.

In the segregationistversionspresentedhereandin the next section, thecorrespondentsattemptnot only to adjust and reassert, but also to amend and embellish the southernsegregationistculturalworldview. Both ideological versionssuggest thatchangebe sought"judiciously,"according to the correspondents'perspectives, but that it could result ingreater ustice for African Americans.

Chargesof communist influences in the SCLC and the NAACP aboundin the corre-spondence.These expressions range from folk wisdom to the columns of such establish-ment commentatorsas Joseph Alsop (a photocopyof anAlsop article titled "Reds WormInto Rights Groups"was included in a letter fromApril 1964). Many of the remarksareseemingly off-hand, or handy epithets easily drawn from the general vocabularyof theearly 1960s. Forexample,one letter claims "youareone of the biggest liars in thecountry. . . calling yourcommunistprogram'Christian'."Another writerrefers to "yourCommu-nist coalition," while yet another writer addresses King as the leader of the "SouthernCommunistLiars Conference."One letterbegins:

A-The real VILLEN of the RACE PROBLEMare the REDS! They are in turn,B-Using the N.A.A.C.P. as DUPES, to,C-Destroy the freedom of both the Whites and Coloredin the south.

Particularlyafter King's public condemnationof United States involvement in Vietnam,manyletter writersquestionedhis patriotismand accused him of being naive and of givingaid and comfort to the enemy.Interestingly,while the connectionsbetween civil rightsorganizationsandcommunismwere made easily, the condemnationsof communism in our sample overwhelminglydidnot include its putativeatheism.Rather, he distinction exists in the advocacyof a naturalsecular order of American segregation, in contrast to the misguided secular disorderofcommunism.The most commoncharge againstcommunists was theirplans for intermar-riageand"race-mixing" nd thereforeconstitutinga threat o thegood orderand continued

vitality of Americansociety:[Y]our "rabble-rousing"alks are creaters of hatreds and violence ... NAACP usesbig money ... to promoteviolence, race-mixingor any other un-American activi-ties.... Communistsare known to demand"race-mixing."

Eventhoughsocialismis frequentlycontrastedwith the "freeenterprisesystem,"no visionof socialist economics emerges.Rather,socialism is typifiedas the symboliccounterto theAmericansystem, which is portrayedas a vehicle of opportunity,one that is as available toAfrican Americansas to anyoneelse. The idea thatAmericaremainsa land of opportunityfor all, and all must bearresponsibilityfor their own circumstances,leads to the fourthversion.Symbolic SegregationistConstruction, he Open System,and Questionsof StrategyIf the United States is a society of mobility,the responsibilityfor achievingequalityrestson individuals and theirmotivations.The fundamentalproblemof equality is one of per-

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SOCIOLOGICALTHEORYsonal effort and worthiness. One can potentially earn one's place as a full member ofsociety in an open system. In this accounting, segregationremains a measureof the extentto which black Americansare not yet readyfor orentitled to equality.The pathto equalitycomes not fromprotests,demands,ordisorder,but fromeducation,self-improvement,andpatience, virtues the southernsegregationistculturalworldview does not associate withAfrican Americans. Contrary to the principles guiding the religious and historical-"scientific"constructions, he potentialfor equalityis available,if African Americans canfind within themselves the wherewithalto achieve it.

We find these values appended o the symbolicsegregationistconstruction(see Kinderand Sears 1981). It often is associated with an idealized image of the immigrantworkingclasses' upward mobility and assimilationin the new world. The extralinguistic strategyfor this image is incorporatedn the overusedadage, "We made it on our own [by impli-cation, throughhardwork, diligence, andcivility]; you should do the same."Sometimesthese experiences are intertwinedwith expressionsof religious doctrinecounseling a vir-tuousmorality appliedto secularachievementsandlaw-abidingbehavior. It is frequentlyexpressed in the correspondence:We Denveritesare sick & tired of the way you areleading your people to animositytoward the White and Black ... Those Southernpeople will come aroundone day,but no, you have to try to force and show them thatyou want the same now.

The religious underpinningsof this argumentexist in the naturalcondition of social orderas partof God'splan,and"agitation" r "militance"s not a "Christian"trategy or socialchange. Even less is there a religious justificationfor breakinghuman law:

[T]he Bible does NOT record a single instancewhere the church,as such or even agroupof "BELIEVERS N CHRISTJESUS"engagedin anyovert actof aggressionagainst"THE LAW OF THELAND" . . . you had bettercheck youracts of aggres-sion with what God's Word authorizes and instructs.... Breakinglaws illegally asyou andthe NAACP aredoing, is againstthe teachingof the Holy Bible, and at thesame time being done with malice in your heartsto make trouble instead of peace.The religious language used in this example does not recount a divine plan that sepa-

rates theraces, nor does it define anessential inequalityas natural.Rather, he assumptionis thatorder s natural,Americansociety is ideally organized,andany people who followChristianprincipleswould be pursuinga differentcourse of temporalaction (if not nec-essarily differentgoals) from thatbeing pursuedby King and the SCLC. Althoughreli-gious objections to King's campaignsarenumerous n this ideological construction,theyare not identical to the theological justifications for continuedsegregation.Whether theauthorsfully faced the implications, the religious references used within the symbolicconstruction eave open the possibility of change andequality,if pursuedcorrectly.In the following example, the earnedcomponent of equality is articulated and con-trastedwith the presumablydeservedqualityof segregation:Why don't you colored people get busy and do somethingworthwhile, so you willdeserve to be integratedwiththe whites? ... Look at all the coloredpeoplewho haveachievedworthwhilepositions or themselves .. the whitepeople accept hembecausethey deserve to be accepted.

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IDEOLOGICALLANGUAGEAND SOCIAL MOVEMENTMOBILIZATIONThe symbolic versionof the segregationist deology emphasizesthe "landof opportunity"and "earnyour equality"themes couched in the secular language of social and politicalorder:

[Respect]must be earnednotdemandedby a personof anyrace.... We havenegroesin ourcommunitywho have earnedthe respect of the white people ... [and]retainthatrespectby living useful and well-ordered lives.Withvery best wishes,A loyal AmericanE PLURIBUS UNUMInterpretedas a linguistic strategy,the additionof the national motto "outof many,one"may simply be a postscriptthatwas meant to reinforce the writer's legitimacy as a "loyalAmerican."However,it may also be ironic in that the expressionholds out the promiseofeventual integration nto nationallife, but does so by summoningthe images of the suc-cessful assimilationexperiencesof European mmigrantsand the qualitiesof their collec-tive characters hatpresumablymade thatpossible. Hence, in this view segregationremainsunderstoodas a naturalorder,but integrationachieved in an orderlymanner s consistentwith nationalidentity.Several writerswho employ the symbolic pragmatic strategyfeel it important o pro-vide a context for their opposition that distances them from the traditional ntransigentracial hostility common among correspondentswho created the religious and historical-"scientific" constructions.Such authorsportraythemselves as concerned with issues oflaw andorder, he welfare of AfricanAmericans,and thepotentialconsequencesof backlash:

[G]o back to preachingthe Gospel of Jesus ... to your race andtry to win souls totheLord,andstop wastingyourtime in violating city ordinancesandstirringup yourraceto get them into more trouble. ... I love thecoloredpeople, worked in the fieldswith them, listen to them preach,sing andpray. My fathergave the colored peoplethe landto build them a church when I wasjust a child, andthey hadsome gloriousmeetings thereand there was always good order.I'm no enemy of the negro. I talk [to] and like them. But why agitateandbuild uprace hatred. Most southernnegroes try/want to get along.[signed]A Mississippian(not a negro hater)

Ideological Versions:Agency, Structuring,and SituatedLanguageThese fourparticularized deological versions offered language "repertoires" s potentialcourses of action upon which opponentsto integrationcould draw to apply to their cul-tural, structural,and immediate circumstances(Tilly 1977, 1995; Williams 1995). Theserepertoireswere createdsimultaneouslywithin the context of one historicalmoment,circa1955-1968. Thatfour differentiatedversions occurredsimultaneously s evidence of cul-turalagency,as groupsof personsfashionedparticularized deological "repertoires"o fittheir interests and relevantcircumstances.

Language'sinterpretation nabledcorrespondents o create the four distinctideologicalversions.We wish to delve deeperinto a specific aspectof this sociolinguistic process.Wewant to bringinto bold relief a direct connection betweenanimmediatelyrelevant circum-

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SOCIOLOGICALTHEORYstance and its effects uponthe structuringof a particularized egregationist anguage.Weillustratehow King's efforts to integrate housing in the urbanNorth influenced the con-structionof a particularized deological version.Duringthe periodof the SCLC's efforts to integrateChicagohousing, correspondentsfrom the area wrote to King interpretingcampaignevents occurringin that city. Theyperceived King's appeal for open housing as a threat to their economic and culturalinterests-as a threat to both theirpropertyand their status.Interpreting hese crisis cir-cumstances within a northernurbanenvironmentresulted in a particularized deologicalformulationfit to the cross-cuttingpressuresfrom the segregationistworldview,the cor-respondents' nterests,anda liberal-urban ulture. OurexamplefromChicagoillustratesasituationallygroundeduse of the fourthideological versionpresentedabove,the symbolicsegregationistconstruction.

King in Chicago: Symbolic SegregationistConstructionand the Potentialfor EqualityKing moved his activities to the North in the mid-1960s, beginning protestsfor Chicagoopen housing in January1966 (Ralph 1993:60-65). Not surprisingly,the movement'sgeographic changefrom the Southto the North was controversial.There hadbeen supportfrom white northernersorchangingsouthernJimCrow laws andpractices.There was lesssupportfor charges of northerncomplicity in segregationist institutionalarrangements,particularlywhen these appeared o involve voluntarysocial arrangementsn civil societyrather han overt discriminatoryactions enforcedby state and local segregation aws.The contents of adverse letters written to King duringthis periodreflect the changingsituational context of their production.The Chicago demonstrations for open housingpromptedmany etters rom localcorrespondents.n their etters, hecorrespondents mpha-sized the symbolic ideological construction.The discourse shifted from the argument hatsegregationwas an immutablepartof a changeless naturalorder,as was expressedin thereligious and historical constructions,to a rationale that implied a potential for greaterequalitythat was as yet unrealized.However,the source of the inequalitywas still locatedin African Americans. It was alleged thatblacks lackedthe strengthor will to participatefully in societal opportunities.Continuedsegregation tself became a measuringrodof thedegree to which black Americans were not yet ready for, or worthy of, equality andintegration.The extralinguistic strategies imputed alleged motivational and circumstantialprob-lems amongAfrican Americans. Black Americanspurportedlyackedthe wherewithalforintegration,and their neighborhoodswere evidence of their motivational shortfall. Theletters sent to King duringhis Chicago campaignfor open housing highlightthe situatedcharacterof the productionof ideological language-that is, a symbolicconstruction it tothe multiple cross-pressures impinging upon the letter writers. An example of thisformulation:

So you are going to get rid of the slums, well let me tell you, in order to do it, youwould have to eliminate all the negroes, because they create slums; I lived in poorneighborhoods n my life, we did not call them slums, the houses were old and noconveniencesbut we ... keptthem clean andbought soapandpaintinstead of liquorand dope . . . our mothers cleaned the house . . . our fatherscleaned and fixed thepremises....A self-identified Jewish woman from Chicago describedher relationshipwith a blackwoman from her neighborhoodwho had taken care of her as a child when her fatherwas

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IDEOLOGICALLANGUAGEAND SOCIAL MOVEMENTMOBILIZATIONsick; the writeralso provides examples of anti-Semitismshe had experiencedin her ownlife, and asked why no one protestedthe Holocaust. She goes on:

May I ask why you [King] must clean the apartments,carry garbage, and ashes?Why are not the tenants keeping clean their apartments.... But we also lived inslums ... and I never saw a rat or roach-why because ourjewish people kept thepremisesCLEAN.... [Negroes need to be taught]CLEANLINESS,NUTRITION,CAREOFTHEIRCHILDRENand all the attributes hatcontribute o a measureof,truenot gracious living, when ones funds are limited....Other,moreblatantly segregationist,letterscoming fromChicagoansare less nuancedbut still within the symbolic frame,attributing o blacks themselves the circumstances nwhich they live: "whoturnsa nice neighborhood nto a niggerslum. Of course, theniggersthemselves."Another letterasks King to pay attentionto Atlanta's condition (presumably

before focusing on Chicago):It [AuburnAve.] is a sad place to see now as far as business is concerned. FromJackson St. up to Boulevardall that valuable land vacantnot a coffee bar,sandwichshoporcaf6to be seen.... Whileyou arerunningall over theworldto partsunknownand encouragingthe negroes to go in and push the white man out of all the decentplaces he has worked hardto establishfor his people.... why don'tyou get togetherand put up some nice places on the Avenue and give the negro girls andboys whoneedjobs so bad somethingto do.The circumstancesthatpromptedthese letters, the region of origin of the writers,andthe writers'often

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Ideological Language and Social Movement Mobilization

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