No Dancin’ in Anson
No Dancin’ In Anson: An American Story of Race and Social Change (Jason Aronson, 1995/The Other Press, 2002), explores life in a small West Texas town following a life-imitates-art controversy in which the City Fathers outlawed dancing within the city limits and the controversy that ensued. Anson’s dancing controversy was symptomatic of Anson’s social transformation following the Civil Rights Act. People of Mexican ancestry who during Jim Crow had not been permitted to live within the city limits or eat at its restaurants now comprised a third of the town’s population. No Dancin’ explores the implications of Anson’s profound social change as both individual and a collective experiences and the ways in which this small Texas town may mirror what is taking place in America more generally.