An exploration of many "fringe" lifestyles in Florida, including bikers, ufologists, spiritualists, swingers, "pony girls," strip club owners, nudists, and others.

Florida was the first region of the United States to be discovered, explored, and, after a fashion, settled by Euroamericans. Its population in the early 21st century is approaching 17 million. Within years the number of people living in the state will surpass those living in New York, and the Sunshine State will become the most populous area east of the Mississippi. The first book in English about Florida was written by Jean Ribault. A French adventurer, Ribault established a colony of Huguenots near present-day Jacksonville. He was captured by the very able Spanish commander Pedro Menendez, who ordered his French rival and all his minions killed. The state’s long and colorful past is matched by its equally long and colorful literary production. Strangely, critical assessment of Florida literature has lagged far behind. With this volume, the Florida College English Association has formally begun an effort to correct this lamentable oversight. Included are papers on every aspect of Florida literature and history by scholars from every part of the state who are employed in every kind of institution of higher learning. Of special interest are the studies of Florida literature in the 19th century and in the late 20th and early 21st centuries, areas that are generally ignored in national journals. The papers on the contributions of African-American literary figures, such as Zora Hurston and James Weldon Johnson, are noteworthy. Of particular interest are the suggestions for teaching Florida studies in the classroom, which can be adapted for high school as well as college students.

A New York Times Bestseller Oh, Florida! That name. That combination of sounds. Three simple syllables, and yet packing so many mixed messages. To some people, it’s a paradise. To others, it’s a punch line. As Oh, Florida! shows, it’s both of these and, more important, it’s a Petri dish, producing trends that end up influencing the rest of the country. Without Florida there would be no NASCAR, no Bettie Page pinups, no Glenn Beck radio rants, no USA Today, no “Stand Your Ground,” . . . you get the idea. To outsiders, Florida seems baffling. It’s a state where the voters went for Barack Obama twice, yet elected a Tea Party candidate as governor. Florida is touted as a carefree paradise, yet it’s also known for its perils-alligators, sinkholes, pythons, hurricanes, and sharks, to name a few. It attracts 90 million visitors a year, some drawn by its impressive natural beauty, others bewitched by its manmade fantasies. Oh, Florida! explores those contradictions and shows how they fit together to make this the most interesting state. It is the first book to explore the reasons why Florida is so wild and weird-and why that’s okay. Florida couldn’t be Florida without that sense of the unpredictable, unexpected, and unusual lurking behind every palm tree. But there is far more to Florida than its sideshow freakiness. Oh, Florida! explains how Florida secretly, subtly influences all the other states in the Union, both for good and for ill.

Results from Census 2000 have confirmed that American cities and metropolitan areas lie at the heart of the nation's most pronounced demographic and economic changes. The third volume in the Redefining Urban and Suburban America series describes anew the changing shape of metropolitan American and the consequences for policies in areas such as employment, public services, and urban revitalization. The continued decentralization of population and economic activity in most metropolitan areas has transformed once-suburban places into new engines of metropolitan growth. At the same time, some traditional central cities have enjoyed a population renaissance, thanks to a recent book in "living" downtowns. The contributors to this book probe the rise of these new growth centers and their impacts on the metropolitan landscape, including how recent patterns have affected the government's own methods for reporting information on urban, suburban, and rural areas. Volume 3 also provides a closer look at the social and economic impacts of growth patterns in cities and suburbs. Contributors examine how suburbanization has affected access to employment for minorities and lower-income workers, how housing development trends have fueled population declines in some central cities, and how these patterns are shifting the economic balance between older and newer suburbs. Contributors include Thomas Bier (Cleveland State University), Peter Dreier (Occidental College), William Frey (Brookings), Robert Lang (Virginia Tech), Steven Raphael (University of California, Berkeley), Audrey Singer (Brookings), Michael Stoll (University of California, Los Angeles), Todd Swanstrom (St. Louis University), and Jill Wilson (Brookings).