Historian’s book chosen for new publishing imprint

A book by UNC Charlotte history professor Karen Cox about Confederate monuments is one of the first four books under contract in the newly created Marcie Cohen Ferris and William R. Ferris Imprint for high-profile, general-interest books about the American South.

“The American South is the ideal canvas on which to create a better understanding of our nation and the world,” said John Sherer, the Spangler Family Director of UNC Press. “These funds allow us to commission, acquire and market books by the nation’s leading authors who share that vision but who require the type of financial support normally out of reach for a university press.”

Cox, who teaches courses in Southern history and culture at UNC Charlotte, is one of the nation’s foremost experts on the history of Confederate monuments and the continuing controversy around them.

“As a scholar of the American South, I’m very honored to be included in an initiative that can reach broader audiences,” she said.

Cox’s inclusion in the imprint signals her significance as an important scholar and historian, said Nancy A. Gutierrez, dean of the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences.

“Through her research, writing and public conversations, Dr. Cox illustrates how the history of Confederate monuments continues to affect society today,” Gutierrez said. “Her work is critical not only for historians and other scholars, but for all of us, as we seek understanding and insight about how to navigate these and related issues.”

Cox’s first book, “Dixie’s Daughters: The United Daughters of the Confederacy and the Preservation of Confederate Culture,” won the 2004 Julia Cherry Spruill Prize from the Southern Association for Women Historians for the Best Book in Southern Women’s History. UNC Press published her second book, “Dreaming of Dixie: How the South Was Created in American Popular Culture,” in 2011 and her third book, “Goat Castle: A True Story of Murder, Race and the Gothic South,” in 2017. She also is the editor or co-editor of two additional volumes that explore the history of the South.

In 2019, Cox appeared in Henry Louis Gates’ PBS documentary “Reconstruction: America after the Civil War” and in the BBC production “American History’s Biggest Fibs” with British historian Lucy Worsley. Cox has written op-eds for The New York Times, The Washington Post, CNN, TIME magazine, Publishers Weekly and The Huffington Post and has been interviewed by a number of international, national and regional news outlets due to her expertise on the American South.

UNC Press received a multimillion dollar endowment to support Ferris & Ferris Books. The namesakes of the new imprint have a long-running connection with UNC Press. Their collective work and interests in the South are as expansive and diverse as the region itself.

Marcie Cohen Ferris is professor emerita of American studies at UNC Chapel Hill and past president of the board of directors of the Southern Foodways Alliance. Bill Ferris is professor emeritus of history at the UNC Chapel Hill, where he served as associate director of the Center for the Study of the American South until retirement.

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