Reviews

Gospel According to the Klan: The Kkk's Appeal to Protestant America, 1915-1930 by Kelly J. Baker

nocuplongenough's review against another edition

challenging dark informative sad tense medium-paced

5.0

katdotniche's review against another edition

informative

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Antisemitism, Racism, and Religious bigotry

Minor: Rape

eheimerman's review against another edition

5.0

I read this while doing a research project on the KKK in Pennsylvania during their anti-Catholic surge in the early 20th century. I found this book extremely helpful and well written for this topic - I used this book far more than others on similar topics. It's very specific, so if you're looking for a broad history of the KKK, find something else.

srbelflower's review against another edition

5.0

I read this book for my Race and Religion in the United States class and it is by far the best book I have ever read for a class. The book drew a clear, well-argued connection between how contemporary American WASP religious values have been racialized directly due to the work and legacy of the Klan. One of my favorite parts was Baker's analysis of white womanhood's role in the growth of the Klan and its legacy, with the book going into important detail about white women's efforts during suffrage and beyond to assert white women as the privileged equals of white men in their racial pecking order. In a "colorblind" era it is important to understand how the Klan's values left such a deep rooted impact on WASP religious ideologies, using interpretations of scripture along with the legacy of colonialism and the rise of pseudoscience to assert that the Klan's vision for the world was what the Protestant Christian God had intended. Overall this is an excellent read for someone trying to understand how racism and xenophobia have become so deeply rooted in so many American's interpretation of Christianity.

archifydd's review

4.0

Fascinating. Baker argues that the second iteration of the Klan was not exceptional, but representative of certain swaths of 1920s American culture. One of the things that really jumped out at me is the similarity between the rhetoric of the 1920s Klan and the 1920s DAR. Some of it was so familiar that I want to check to see if they were publishing some of the same nationalist writers.

My only quibble is that I have more unanswered questions about how the Klan developed their theology of white nationalism. Did they come up with these concepts through a practice of "common sense" bible reading, or were they adapting theological models that their leaders had learned through more formal study. A number of Klansmen identified themselves as ministers, but its not clear which denomination they belonged to, how and if they were educated etc - I would have found the answers to those questions very interesting.