|
Books
by Ira Berlin
Slaves without Masters: The Free Negro in the Antebellum South
/
Freedom: A Documentary History of Emancipation
Many Thousands Gone: The First Two Centuries of
Slavery in Mainland North America /
Slaves without Masters
/
Free at Last
* * * *
*
Generations
of Captivity
A History of African American Slaves
By Ira Berlin Ira Berlin traces the history of African-American
slavery in the United States from its beginnings in the
seventeenth century to its fiery demise nearly three hundred
years later.
Most Americans, black and white, have a singular vision of
slavery, one fixed in the mid-nineteenth century when most
American slaves grew cotton, resided in the deep South, and
subscribed to Christianity. Here, however, Berlin offers a
dynamic vision, a major reinterpretation in which slaves and
their owners continually renegotiated the terms of captivity.
Slavery was thus made and remade by successive generations of
Africans and African Americans who lived through settlement and
adaptation, plantation life, economic transformations,
revolution, forced migration, war, and ultimately, emancipation.
Berlin's understanding of the processes that continually
transformed the lives of slaves makes
Generations
of Captivity essential reading for anyone interested in the
evolution of antebellum America. Connecting the "Charter
Generation" to the development of Atlantic society in the
seventeenth century, the "Plantation Generation" to
the reconstruction of colonial society in the eighteenth
century, the "Revolutionary Generation" to the Age of
Revolutions, and the "Migration Generation" to
American expansionism in the nineteenth century, Berlin
integrates the history of slavery into the larger story of
American life. He demonstrates how enslaved black people, by
adapting to changing circumstances, prepared for the moment when
they could seize liberty and declare themselves the
"Freedom Generation."
This epic story, told by a master historian, provides a rich
understanding of the experience of African-American slaves, an
experience that continues to mobilize American thought and
passions today.
* *
* * *
Eminent
historian Berlin revisits and extends by a century the territory
of his honored and groundbreaking Many Thousands Gone: The
First Two Centuries of Slavery in America (1998),
incorporating the "vast outpouring of new research in this
field" in the brief period since its publication and
mirroring that book's structure. In 150 or so pages here, Berlin
recapitulates the argument of his earlier, prize-winning work,
delineating "the making and remaking of slavery" as a
matter of "Generations": the "Charter
Generations," who managed "to integrate themselves
into mainline society during the first century of settlement,
despite their status as slaves and the contempt of the colony's
rulers"; the "Plantation Generations," living in
a world where "blackness and whiteness took on new
meaning," who managed "to forge new communities as 'Africans,'
an identity no one had previously considered or even knew
existed"; and the "Revolutionary Generations,"
beneficiaries, victims, and participants in both the
"revolutionary ideology [and] evangelical upsurge" of
the period.
Berlin,
president of the Organization of American Historians and an
editor of the Remembering Slavery project, is attentive to place
as well as time, and focuses first on New Netherland, the
Chesapeake, and the North, followed by variants in Florida, the
Lower Mississippi Valley and Low Country South Carolina. New to
this book are "the Migration Generations," who
suffered a Second Middle Passage with the accelerated
transcontinental "transfer" of slaves between 1810 and
1861. An epilogue introduces the "Freedom
Generations," reaching into the 1860s. While preserving the
terrible complexity and diversity of North American slavery,
Berlin offers a compact scholarly account of the transformation
of a society with slaves into a slave society. He reveals
without condescension or simplification the inspiring social
structures that arose from a horrific history. While it may not
get the attention of Many Thousands, this book follows up with
grace and determination.
--Publishers Weekly
Although American slavery is generally
thought of as dominating and being dominated by the culture,
politics, and economics of the South, Berlin charts the dynamic
quality of American slavery by placing it into the changing
context of American history and various generations overall. The
experience of the original settlement population adapting to
their new environment produced what Berlin calls the chartered
generation. Most often associated with slavery is plantation
life and the plantation generation, which reflected the western
and southern expansion of the nation as cotton became king of
the economy.
Following
the plantation generation was the revolutionary generation, when
worldwide views on slavery and freedom influenced domestic
politics and culture. Berlin reflects on the contrasts between
the southern experience of slavery and the north's experience
and challenges with its freedmen. The Chesapeake, or upper
south, was for a period the region that dominated the internal
slave trade and facilitated further regional redistribution of
slaves. Finally, Berlin examines the migration generation, the
substantial shift in the black population to the north and
west.
--Vernon
Ford ,
Booklist
(ALA)
Over
the past 20 years, Berlin's work has redefined how scholars
approach the study of slavery and freedom in America. His
scholarship on slavery and race and his complete command of the
enormous literature on slavery now come together to inform this
compelling history. [Generations
of Captivity] reminds us
that the generations after emancipation still resonated with the
culture of those once held in captivity. Essential. --Library
Journal
Generations
of Captivity
A History of African American Slaves
By Ira Berlin
Table of Contents
| Prologue: Slavery and Freedom |
1 |
|
|
| 1. Charter Generations |
21 |
|
|
| 2. Plantation Generations |
51 |
|
|
| 3. Revolutionary Generations |
97 |
|
|
| 4. Migration Generations |
159 |
|
|
| Epilogue: Freedom Generations |
245 |
|
|
|
Tables |
272 |
|
Abbreviations |
280 |
|
Notes |
284 |
|
Acknowledgments |
363 |
|
Index |
365 |
The Charter Generations--those Africans
arrived in the New World not only as slaves but also as sailors
or indentured servants, and who were sometimes able to purchase
their freedom and enjoy moderate prosperity (17th century).
The Plantation Generation--who became part of and made
possible the emergence of a plantation society (largely tobacco
and rice) along the Chesapeake in the seventeenth and eighteenth
centuries (18th century).
The Revolutionary Generation--who both benefited from
(in the north) and suffered because of (in the south0 new ideals
of freedom and liberty brought on by the American and Haitian
Revolutions (19th century)
The Migration Generation--who witnessed and enacted
the most profound and traumatic change in the nature of American
slavery. This generation of African Americans saw the expansion
of the young republic and the rise of cotton as the great cash
crop of the South--and with these the need for a great, captive
labor force. A pattern of forced migration into the interior and
Deep South uprooted and drove apart families, and brought about
the antebellum world with which most of us are familiar (19th
century).
The Freedom Generation--those who lived through the
horrors of the Civil War to ultimately experience the victory of
emancipation--and with it, the first bittersweet taste of
hard-won freedom (19th century).
Harvard
University Press; 374pp; ISBN 0-674-01061-2; 25 March 2003 (pd);
$29.95
Source:
Generations
of Captivity |
