The Oxford Handbook of Slavery in the Americas

by Robert L. Paquette, Mark M. Smith

Overview

The Oxford Handbook of Slavery in the Americas offers penetrating, original, and authoritative essays on the history and historiography of the institution of slavery in the New World. With essays on colonial and antebellum America, Brazil, the Caribbean, the Indies, and South America, the Handbook has impressive geographic and temporal coverage. It also includes a generous range of thematic essays on comparative slavery, the economics of slavery, historical methodology in the field, slavery and the law, for instance.

While obviously indebted to the foundational works of the 1960s and 1970s, current writing on the history of slavery and forms of unfree labor in the Americas has taken decidedly original, new, often ingenious turns. A younger generation of scholars has shown a healthy respect for that tradition while posing new, often interdisciplinary, and theoretically informed questions, considering, for example, the nature and definition of slave resistance in the Americas, evolving meanings of gender and race under slavery, the complicated nature of class formation in unfree societies, the elaboration of proslavery and antislavery ideologies, the origins and subsequent elaboration of race-based slavery, and mechanisms of emancipation.

Written by an international team including some of the field's most eminent historians and the most innovative younger scholars working today, The Oxford Handbook of Slavery in the Americas seeks to explain the enduring importance of the earlier historiography, identify current trends and developments, and offer suggestive but informed commentary on future developments in the field for a global scholarly audience.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780198758815
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	03/14/2016
Series:	Oxford Handbooks
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	792
Sales rank:	841,993
Product dimensions:	6.70(w) x 9.60(h) x 1.70(d)

About the Author

Robert L. Paquette is Publius Virgilius Rogers Professor of American History at Hamilton College and co-founder of the Alexander Hamilton Institute for the Study of Western Civilization in Clinton, New York. He has published extensively on the history of slavery and his Sugar is Made with Blood won the Elsa Goveia Prize given by the Association of Caribbean Historians for the best book in Caribbean history.

Mark M. Smith is Carolina Distinguished Professor of History at the University of South Carolina. He is author or editor of a dozen books, including Mastered by the Clock: Time, Slavery, and Freedom in the American South, winner of the Organization of American Historians' Avery O. Craven Award and South Carolina Historical Society's Book of the Year in 1997. He is the current President of the Historical Society.

Table of Contents

Introduction: Slavery in the Americas, Robert L. Paquette and Mark M. SmithPart I: Places1. Spanish Hispaniola and Puerto Rico, Francisco Scarano2. Mexico and Central America, K. Russell Lohse3. Spanish South American Mainland, Peter Blanchard4. Cuba, Matt D. Childs and Manuel Barcia Paz5. Brazil, Robert W. Slenes6. British West Indies and Bermuda, Trevor Burnard7. Dutch Caribbean, Henk den Heijer8. French Caribbean, John Garrigus9. Colonial and Revolutionary United States, Daniel C. Littlefield10. Early Republic and Antebellum United States, Jeff ForretPart II: Themes, Methods, and Sources11. The Transatlantic Slave Trade, Stephen Behrendt12. The Origins of Slavery in the Americas, John J. McCusker and Russell R. Menard13. Biology and African Slavery, Kenneth F. Kiple14. Indian Slavery, Allan Gallay15. Race and Slavery, Timothy Lockley16. Class and Slavery, Jonathan Daniel Wells17. Religion and Slavery, Douglas Ambrose18. Proslavery Ideology, Jeffrey Robert Young19. United States Slave Law, Paul Finkelman20. Slave Resistance, Douglas R. Egerton21. Slave Culture, Kevin Dawson22. The Economics of Slavery, Peter Coclanis23. Gender and Slavery, Kirsten Wood24. Masters, Eugene D. Genovese and Douglas Ambrose25. Abolition and Antislavery, John Stauffer26. Emancipation, Christopher Schmidt-Nowara27. Slavery and the Haitian Revolution, Stewart R. King28. Internal Slave Trades, Michael Tadman29. Demography and Slavery, Richard H. Steckel30. Comparative Slavery, Enrico Dal Lago31. Finding Slave Voices, Kathleen Hilliard32. Archaeology and Slavery, Theresa SingletonEpiloguePost-Emancipation Adjustments, Stanley L. Engerman

Editorial Reviews

"Will serve as an excellent resource for serious history students and instructors, who will find this an invaluable class resource. Recommended."--Library Journal

"This book is comprehensive and is required reading for anyone interested in teaching a course on slavery in the Americas... The editors and contributors are to be applauded for successfully piecing together the many different threads of a most complex and interesting field." -- History: Reviews of New Books

From the Publisher

In this book's introduction, editors Paquette (America history, Hamilton Coll.) and Smith (history, Univ. of South Carolina) note that they make "no claim to utter comprehensiveness" on their vast subject but that the text "offers good coverage and thoroughness and will contribute to further advances in the field." They and their vast array of contributors have certainly fulfilled that promise. Handbook is divided into two sections. The first is organized around the practice of slavery in specific places, including not simply North but Central and South America and the Caribbean. The second section focuses on wide-ranging themes, methods, and sources. The book includes diverse chapters on "Indian Slavery," "Religion and Slavery," "Proslavery Ideology," "United States Slave Law," "Gender and Slavery," and "Archaeology and Slavery," to name but a few. Each author looks in depth at the given subject, providing a bibliography, and many offer thoughts for further research and inquiry.Verdict Though likely too dense a tome for the general reader or casual historian, this volume will serve as an excellent resource for serious history students and instructors, who will find this an invaluable class resource. Recommended.—Julie Biando Edwards, Univ. of Montana Lib., Missoula

Library Journal