But because it is put forward by a fatuous Charleston , S.C. , college professor , we hear it for what Horwitz rightly calls a clever glide around race and slavery , rather like the slick-tongued defense of the Southern ' way of life ' made by antebellum orators , South Carolinians in particular .
Because it is an Ivy League , New England college professor , it sounds like a damning indictment of race and slavery in the South .