Fillingim, David. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press, 2003.  Pp. 170,  $18.00 (USD).  ISBN: 0-86554-896-X (paper).

[1] In this intriguing monograph, David Fillingim analyzes various aspects of country music as a form of theological reflection stemming from a marginalized community, the Rednecks.  His work is obviously dependent on the work of James Cone and John Michael Spencer on African American spirituals and the blues, especially the latter’s emphasis on “theomusicology.”  Fillingim puts forth an interesting and accessible, if problematic, case for taking country music seriously as not only a reflection of “the religious imagination unfettered by the chains of doctrinal propriety” (3), but also the hopeful engaging of ultimate concern(s) by the Redneck community.

[2] Fillingim’s introduction (“Honky-Tonkology: Taking Country Music Seriously”) sets out the parameters, and defines the three major topics under discussion: theology, Rednecks, and country music.  He begins his discussion of theology by arguing that “country music embodies certain basic beliefs about reality or, to borrow Tillich’s often-used phrase, about matters of ultimate concern” (6).  Country music, he notes, is the “theological self-expression of the hillbilly or Redneck,” defining Redneck as the community historically represented as one that is marginalized and oppressed within the larger Southern culture, and most often represented by the sharecropping migrant farmer.  Fillingim traces the heterogeneous roots and history of country music, asserting that even though “country music has never been completely isolated from the mainstream,” it is “legitimately read as the music of a people who have been separate from the mainstream” (14).  Fillingim concludes that his will be a substantive analysis, focusing on the lyrics of country songs and not on the functional aspect of the music.

[3] Fillingim begins his first chapter (“Gospel Songs and Cheatin’ Songs: Suffering and the Failure of Redneck Theology”) by asserting that the genres of white gospel and “cheatin’ songs” raise the issues of theodicy (in the former) and moral meaning (in the latter).  He draws an analogy between these songs for Rednecks and spirituals/blues for the black community, noting that they are not only theological statements, but also declarations of liberation “because they respond to experiences of oppression and marginalization” (26).  In his discussion of white Southern gospel, Fillingim notes that these songs encourage passivity in the face of suffering, waiting “for future rewards while trusting Jesus to calm one’s inner tensions in the meantime” (30).  These emphases betray a fundamental dualism in white gospel between this world and the next, where this world is not only evil, it is to be rejected in favor of the future bliss of heaven.  Fillingim notes that, in comparison to the black spirituals, white gospel songs “have functioned to prevent conscientization and liberative praxis” (31) by stressing individualism over communalism and dualistic thinking over incarnational.  His discussion of “cheatin’ songs” focuses on the mundane experience of romantic love which, according to Fillingim, possess the same function for the Redneck community as the blues do for the black community; they are “the music of an oppressed people seeking to transcend but not ignore their experience” (36).  Furthermore, they both “reject otherworldly dualism in favor of bodily acts of protest against the contradictions of life at the social margins.”  Fillingim concludes by pointing to the failure of the theologies espoused in white gospel and cheatin’ songs.  The former, he claims, “function to reinforce the status quo through an ideology of domesticity,” while the latter often adopt a fatalistic outlook (40).  Taken together, these songs focus on escapism rather than engagement and they thus lose their liberative potential.  In the face of this failure, Fillingim issues a call to Redneck theology to develop a perspective that refuses to acknowledge either of the above extremes as viable options.

[4]  Fillingim then moves on to the person many consider to be the central figure in country music history: Hank Williams.  After discussing Williams’s turbulent life, career, and early death at age twenty-nine, he builds on the work of Steve Goodson to discuss what he feels is the “core moral/theological outlook of country music” (44), namely, “Hillbilly Humanism.”  He notes, “This philosophy begins with a ‘Christian-based’ affirmation of the dignity of persons,” which leads to the recognition that a “person’s worth derives solely from his or her humanness and is not augmented by improvements in socio-economic status” (50). 

[5]  Fillingim then examines Williams’ gospel songs, finding them to be quite pessimistic and closer to black rather than white gospel in general.  This pessimism, Fillingim argues, is exemplified by “Hank’s strongest hope,” i.e., “baptismal suicide” (55).  Put another way, “Hank effectively rejects the shallow and disembodied hope of the gospel of heaven and seeks instead a way to affirm life in its embodied earthiness” (57).  Even so, Fillingim claims that Williams does not reject religion, but instead maintains a protesting and pleading relationship with the ultimate. He does not provide detail about what this base is nor does he give any evidence to support it.  In fact, he takes pains to note that Hank was ambiguously religious.  He concludes this chapter with an examination of two main figures in country music who serve as heirs to Williams’s rather bleak outlook: George Jones and Merle Haggard.

[6]  After a chapter analyzing the songs and influence of Garth Brooks—undoubtedly the most successful country music artist of the transitional 1990s—Fillingim begins his discussion of women in country music by noting the seeming contradiction between the concept of feminism and the traditionalism inherent in country music.  He pushes the connection, noting his task is “to find country performances that criticize some aspect of women’s oppression by construing it in relation to God or to that which is of ultimate concern” (105).  For Fillingim, female country artists are valuable theologically because they focus on the experience of oppressed or marginalized women, suggesting that “the answers to ultimate questions—the meanings of life—are to be found within the mundane experiences of women” (106).  He then examines three key female artists—Loretta Lynn, Tammy Wynette, and Dolly Parton—then quickly mentions some of the newer female artists before ending the chapter.  These two chapters on Brooks and women in country music seems to stretch the connections to any sort of religious concept, especially in the latter chapter, which comes off as more of a reading of feminist concerns in country music, rather than anything having to do with theology.

[7] Fillingim systematizes the results of his investigation by organizing his conclusion into six interconnected themes—dignity, fate, love, work, responsibility, and hope—which represent the assumptions behind the theology he finds channeling out of Williams’s  “Hillbilly Humanism.”  It is the last of the themes, hope, through which Fillingim makes his most impassioned argument on behalf of the function of country music.  “Good country songs,” he writes, “especially ‘pain songs’—have the effect, ironically, of relieving pain.  Setting one’s pessimism to music becomes a kind of optimism.  Country music functions like the Psalms of lament, providing a framework for raising or deepening misery and despair to the level of ultimate concern and then releasing them” (155).

[8] Overall, this book serves as an intriguing, if uneven, foray into country music as an expression of religiosity.  However, there are a number of problems and questions left unanswered.  Aside from a number of typographical and stylistic errors, Fillingim’s definition of theology seems too broad to be useful as an analytic tool.  In addition, one must consider whether or not it is still appropriate to view country music as the theological cries of a marginalized community, given its current audience profile and amalgam of influences.  Fillingim contradicts himself when he notes that a “pure grassroots redneck religion is hard to find” (28), yet bases most of his book on the presupposition that country represents the faith-wails of this community.  If we cannot be specific regarding the content of Redneck faith, how can we say that country music represents it? Fillingim mentions Texas singer-songwriters Guy Clark and Townes Van Zandt, but does not examine their work in any detail.  These two, their colleague Eric Taylor, and the generation of singer-songwriters they influenced (especially Lyle Lovett and Darden Smith) use explicitly religious imagery and terms in their work.  Perhaps a chapter on these descendants of Redneck country (Taylor and Smith specifically) might have proved illuminating as well.  In sum, Fillingim’s work has much to commend it and it certainly moves the discourse forward, but unfortunately it is simply too uneven to recommend wholeheartedly.

Dan W. Clanton, Jr.
University of Denver
danclantonjr@yahoo.com