Creole New Orleans: Race and Americanization

by Joseph Logsdon (Editor)

This collection of six original essays explores the peculiar ethnic composition and history of New Orleans, which the authors persuasively argue is unique among American cities. The focus of Creole New Orleans is on the development of a colonial Franco-African culture in the city, the ways that culture was influenced by the arrival of later immigrants, and the processes that led to the eventual dominance of the Anglo-American community.

Essays in the book's first section focus not only on the formation of the curiously blended Franco-African culture but also on how that culture, once established, resisted change and allowed New Orleans to develop along French and African creole lines until the early nineteenth century. Jerah Johnson explores the motives and objectives of Louisiana's French founders, giving that issue the most searching analysis it has yet received. Gwendolyn Midlo Hall, in her account of the origins of New Orleans' free black population, offers a new approach to the early history of Africans in colonial Louisiana.

The second part of the book focuses on the challenge of incorporating New Orleans into the United States. As Paul F. LaChance points out, the French immigrants who arrived after the Louisiana Purchase slowed the Americanization process by preserving the city's creole culture. Joesph Tregle then presents a clear, concise account of the clash that occurred between white creoles and the many white Americans who during the 1800s migrated to the city. His analysis demonstrates how race finally brought an accommodation between the white creole and American leaders.

The third section centers on the evolution of the city's race relations during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Joseph Logsdon and Caryn Cossé Bell begin by tracing the ethno-cultural fault line that divided black Americans and creole through Reconstruction and the emergence of Jim Crow. Arnold R. Hirsch pursues the themes discerned by Logsdon and Bell from the turn of the century to the 1980s, examining the transformation of the city's racial politics.

Collectively, these essays fill a major void in Louisiana history while making a significant contribution to the history of urbanization, ethnicity, and race relations. The book will serve as a cornerstone for future study of the history of New Orleans.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, African American

352 pages, Paperback

First published July 1, 1992

About the author

Joseph Logsdon was an American historian. He was a professor at University of New Orleans. Logsdon is known for his collaboration with Sue Eakin on a 1968 scholarly edition of Twelve Years a Slave.

Reviews

[Glen · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is an interesting series of historical essays which reviews the history of race relations in New Orleans from the city's founding until the election of mayor Sidney Barthelemy in 1986. Some of the essays are very detailed and include demographic information that might be tough sledding for some, but along the way a picture emerges of the role played by the "Creoles" of New Orleans, both white and black. The picture shows the activism of some of the black creoles who looked to the promise of the 1848 upheavals in France that led to putatively equal rights for all, irrespective of race, as a model that might be replicated in the United States, and it shows how that activism eventually gave way to the American insistence on racial bifurcation as politically non-negotiable. Also along the way one get an acquaintance with major players such as Aristide Mary, Rodolphe Desdunes, Albion Tourgee, Ernest "Dutch" Morial, and many others. A worthwhile read.

[Arleen Faustina · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent academic evaluation of why Americans are prejudiced along color lines.

[Michelle · Rating 4 out of 5]

i read this for school shortly after moving to new orleans. it was a real slog - academic and dry, full of names, dates, figures and footnotes i memorized and forgot soon after. flipping through it again, eight years later, i found it infinitely more interesting and engaging.