Page "belles_lettres" Paragraph 164

An example of the changes which have crept over the Southern region may be seen in the Southern Negro's quest for a position in the white-dominated society, a problem that has been reflected in regional fiction especially since 1865.

Today the Negro must discover his role in an industrialized South, which indicates that the racial aspect of the Southern dilemma hasn't changed radically, but rather has gradually come to be reflected in this new context, this new coat of paint.

The Negro faces as much, if not more, difficulty in fitting himself into an urban economy as he did in an agrarian one.

This represents a gradual change in an ever-present social problem.

But there have been abrupt changes as well: the sit-ins, the picket lines, the bus strikes -- all of these were unheard-of even ten years ago.

Today's evidence, such as the fact that only three Southern states ( South Carolina, Alabama and Mississippi ) still openly defy integration, would have astounded many of yesterday's Southerners into speechlessness.