A Response to William Davies’ “A Review of Arlie Russell Hochschild’s Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right (2016: New York: New Press, 351 pp)”

In his highly thoughtful review, Davies invites a comparison between British “leavers” and American Trump voters, one we might extend these days across much of the globe. British leavers (although it includes other groups, here I am imagining the British Defense League as nicely described by Hilary Pilkington in Loud and Proud) and American populists may share what I call a “deep story.” In each version of the deep story, a “good citizen” is “waiting in line” for a coveted reward—financial means and honored identity. In each, other people “cut in line,” moving that person backward. As the story goes, a person standing ahead of them—more urbane and educated—turns around to insult them for being backward, ill-educated, prejudiced—or in the case of the Louisianans I studied, a “redneck.” Both groups fear becoming “strangers in their own land.”