“Hear the Table Call of the South:” White Supremacist Rhetoric and the 1950 Charleston Receipts Junior League Cookbook

“Hear the Table Call of the South:” White Supremacist Rhetoric and the 1950 Charleston Receipts Junior League Cookbook

Peitho Volume 20 Issue 2 Spring/Summer 2018

Author(s): Amy Mecklenburg-Faenger

Abstract: Charleston Receipts, “the oldest Junior League Cookbook still in print,” offers an opportunity to further consider the rhetorical work of cookbooks when circulated outside the home. Originally compiled in 1950 as a fund-raising project, Charleston Receipts is a common type of cookbook for American women’s organizations. However, since it was penned by upper-crust Junior League Club members, Charleston Receipts circulates elite white narratives about race and class relations in the mid-century south in addition to its recipes for Plantation Punch and Cooter Soup.