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Unburdened by conscience : a black people's collective account of America's ante-bellum South and the aftermath / Anthony W. Neal.
LIBRA E449 .N43 2010
Available from offsite location
- Format:
- Book
- Author/Creator:
- Neal, Anthony W.
- Language:
- English
- Subjects (All):
- Enslaved persons--Abuse of--Southern States.
- Enslaved persons.
- Enslaved persons--Southern States--Social conditions.
- Slaveholders--Southern States.
- Slaveholders.
- Social conditions.
- Enslaved persons--Abuse of.
- Southern States.
- Physical Description:
- xi, 153 pages ; 23 cm
- Edition:
- Revised edition.
- Place of Publication:
- Lanham, Md. : University Press of America, [2010]
- Summary:
- In Unburdened by Conscience, Anthony W. Neal forcefully argues that influential historians have been unable to offer a complete account of ante-bellum-era American slavery because of their preoccupation with humanizing the slaveholders. He charges them with concealing the full horrors of slavery in order to present the slaveholders in a more positive light. By skillfully weaving together candid first-hand accounts of courageous ex-slaves, Neal then permits readers to see slavery in the United States from their point of view. Former slaves talk openly about the break-up of their marital unions and families and about matters rarely examined in most American slavery history books. Those issues include the slaveholders' legally-sanctioned acts of violence, their practice of slave-breeding, and their rape of black women. Through this work, Neal gives a voice to black people who endured American slavery, and presents a sobering record not found in most books on the topic.
- Contents:
- Scholarship on the brutality of American slavery
- A monopoly of violence in the slaveholder's hands
- The slaves' undying faith in God
- The torture of black women and children
- Public whippings : a terrible part of living
- White man's law : black man's grief
- The omnipresent slave patrols
- A reluctance to call it rape
- Master-on-slave rape revealed
- The threat of injury or death
- Slave resistance
- Rape and slave-breeding
- Begetting children for profit
- The humane home-breaker in slavery historiography
- The importance of the slave family
- The break-up of marital unions through slave sales
- The promiscuous bondswoman : myth or reality?
- The break-up of slave families
- One hundred more years of racism and cruelty
- Epilogue.
- Notes:
- Includes bibliographical references (pages [143]-147) and index.
- ISBN:
- 9780761849650
- 0761849653
- OCLC:
- 506327366
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