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Goodson recognized for best Georgia history book
March 7, 2003
CARROLLTON, GA - Dr. Steve Goodson, associate professor of history at the University of West Georgia, has been selected by the Georgia Historical Society for the Best Book Published on Georgia History during the past year for his book, Highbrows, Hillbillies, and Hellfire: Public Entertainment in Atlanta, 1880-1930.
Highbrows is about commercial entertainment, such as theater, movies, vaudeville, burlesque, and popular and classical music, in Atlanta between 1880 and 1930.
Goodson became interested in writing about the history of Atlanta when he was a graduate student at Emory University. He said historians who had written about entertainment usually ignored the South, and instead focused on the big cities of the North and Midwest.
“The South has played a vital role in the history of American pop culture, and this was a particularly vibrant time in Atlanta’s history as a city,” says Goodson. “I wanted to see what Atlanta’s history with entertainment showed about the values and worldview of southerners during this period, and also to see what Atlanta’s experience could add to the history of commercial entertainment in the U.S.”
Goodson has been working on the book for the past 11 years, and he began his study with his dissertation, which he completed in 1995. He spent a lot of time researching 50 years of Atlanta newspapers.
Although Goodson has published scholarly articles and a number of reviews, this is his first published book. It was published by the University of Georgia Press in 2002.
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