FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — A new study on the history of literacy in the South claims that, contrary to historical assumptions, the vast majority of Southerners in the early 19^th century could and did read. More than 80 percent of the white population was literate, says a University of Arkansas historian. And evidence now suggests that it could be a conservative estimate.

"Historians have tended to compare Southern literacy rates with those of New England and conclude that Southerners weren’t reading much," said Beth Barton Schweiger, assistant professor of history. "The problem with that assumption is that literacy rates in New England were uncharacteristically high for the Western world. If you look at rates of reading in Western Europe, you find the numbers very comparable to those of the American South."

Schweiger has undertaken a study of literacy and print in the pre-war South, spanning the years 1800-1860. In the course of her research, she has found surprisingly high literacy rates as well as indications that Southerners were motivated to read for reasons other than economic gain. The project, she hopes, will yield information about the intellectual history of the South — a subject long neglected by historians.

Schweiger presented her work at the recent American History Association meeting in San Francisco. She is currently working under a nine-month fellowship at Yale University’s Institute for the Advanced Study of Religion, where much of the research for this study has been conducted.

In addition to white readers, Schweiger estimates that nearly 10 percent of slaves were literate — a seemingly small percentage until you consider that after the 1830s, laws prohibited them from learning to read. Among free blacks, however, the literacy rate matched and possibly exceeded that of whites, Schweiger said. This could be partly attributed to the fact that free blacks tended to congregate in cities, where they occupied jobs that required reading skills.

Schweiger believes one of the reasons historians have underestimated literacy rates in the South is because they’ve relied on proof of writing skills to guide their count. Sorting through old documents, scholars noted the percentage of people who could write their signatures and used that figure to calculate the literate population.

In fact, 19^th century Southerners considered writing and reading two very different skills, and those skills were not necessarily taught in tandem, according to Schweiger. Looking at the growth of the print industry, the prevalence of book advertisements in newspapers and at historical personal accounts, Schweiger believes reading was a far more common practice than writing in the pre-war South. If so, many of the people who penned a simple "X" on the dotted line may have been able to read the very document they could not sign.

The high literacy among both whites and blacks is even more surprising considering the difficulty of learning to read at that time. Prior to the Civil War, public schools did not exist in the South. And while private schooling was available, few families could afford to send their children. Nevertheless, people taught themselves to read outside the classroom — sounding it out alone or learning from a family member. Slave children sometimes snuck lessons from the literate children of their owners.

Applying such effort indicates that reading was a valued skill. The 20^th century promoted literacy as a means of raising one’s social status or entering a better-paying career, Schweiger said. But 19^th century Southerners seemed to value reading even though it seldom resulted in financial or social gain.

Unlike New England, the South operated on a rural economy, she explained: "You don’t have to know how to read to push a plow. The economic motive simply didn’t exist for most Southerners, yet the vast majority could and did read."

Furthermore, Southerners did not seem to view literacy as a tool for social advancement. Schweiger chose to examine the pre-war South because she wanted to know if reading made a positive social impact on a society steeped in oppression.

"I think it’s generally assumed that reading is a social good. But that doesn’t necessarily mean it immediately improved the quality of people’s lives," she said. "Slaves may be our best example of that. Of the roughly four million slaves living in the South at the time, 10 percent could read. That’s a large number of literate people who nonetheless continued to live in bondage."

To Schweiger, that fact indicates that literacy served some other purpose in people’s lives, and her research has sought to identify the various motives that inspired people to read. Considering the isolated, rural environment of the South, it’s a sure bet that many people read for entertainment, she said. But Schweiger also has found evidence that reading served a higher, perhaps even moral, function.

In compiling a bibliography of what 19^th century Southerners read, Schweiger has encountered a great deal of religious material — from books of sermons to ecclesiastic newspapers, religious pamphlets and essays on church doctrine.

The usual historic treatment of Southern religion portrays it as an oral tradition of stump preachers and tent revivals, Schweiger said. But in truth, Southern religious culture included a written component that was both highly learned and widely popular. A desire to read the Bible may have constituted a significant incentive for both black and white Southerners to become literate, she believes.

In addition to searching through publication lists and bookstore advertisements, Schweiger has pored over the personal records of individual Southerners, looking for evidence of what they read and why they did so. Diaries and letters emphasized reading as a means of bettering oneself, revealing a commitment to self-improvement that seemed to permeate the South.

Such findings offer a glimpse into the intellectual history of this region, Schweiger says. "So much of historical scholarship has focused on the material reality of the South: slavery, the economy, politics. We also need to look at the intellectual reality of these people. What are the intangible reasons that caused them to live as they did?

"This project has allowed me to look at both sides," she added. "Books and newspapers and magazines were material objects, involved with a market economy. But they were also a doorway into people’s minds — their interests, imaginations and values."

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