| Description |
xxiv, 703 pages : illustrations, maps ; 25 cm |
| Contents |
Prelude: Two infant slave societies -- PART I: CONTOURS OF THE PLANTATION EXPERIENCE: Two plantation worlds -- Material life -- Fieldwork -- Skilled work -- PART II: ENCOUNTERS BETWEEN WHITES AND BLACKS: Patriarchs, plain folks, and slaves -- Economic exchanges between Whites and Blacks -- Social transactions between Whites and Blacks -- PART III: THE BLACK WORLD: African American societies -- Family life -- African American cultures -- Coda: Two mature slave societies. |
| Summary |
"On the eve of the American Revolution, nearly three-quarters of all African Americans in mainland British America lived in two regions: the Chesapeake, centered in Virginia, and the Lowcountry, with its hub in South Carolina. Here, Philip Morgan compares and contrasts African American life in these two regional Black cultures, exploring the differences as well as the similarities. The result is a detailed and comprehensive view of slave life in the colonial American South." |
|
"Morgan explores the role of land and labor in shaping culture, the everyday contacts of masters and slaves that defined the possibilities and limitations of cultural exchange, and finally the interior life of Blacks--their social relations, their family and kin ties, and the major symbolic dimensions of life: language, play, and religion. He provides a balanced appreciation for the oppressiveness of bondage and for the ability of slaves to shape their lives, showing that, whatever the constraints, slaves contributed to the making of their history. Victims of a brutal, dehumanizing system, slaves nonetheless strove to create order to their lives, to preserve their humanity, to achieve dignity, and to sustain dreams of a better future." -- The publisher. |
| Subject |
African Americans -- Chesapeake Bay Region (Md. and Va.) -- History -- 18th century.
|
|
African Americans -- South Carolina -- History -- 18th century.
|
|
Enslaved persons -- Chesapeake Bay Region (Md. and Va.) -- History -- 18th century.
|
|
Enslaved persons -- South Carolina -- Social life and customs.
|
|
Plantation life -- South Carolina -- History -- 18th century.
|
|
Enslaved persons -- South Carolina -- History -- 18th century.
|
|
South Carolina -- Race relations.
|
|
Plantation life -- Chesapeake Bay Region (Md. and Va.) -- History -- 18th century.
|
|
Chesapeake Bay Region (Md. and Va.) -- Race relations.
|
|
Enslaved persons -- Chesapeake Bay Region (Md. and Va.) -- Social life and customs.
|
| Added Author |
Omohundro Institute of Early American History & Culture.
|
| ISBN |
0807824097 cloth alkaline paper |
|
9780807824092 cloth alkaline paper |
|
0807847178 paperback alkaline paper |
|
9780807847176 paperback alkaline paper |
|
