Slavery: History and Historians

by Peter J. Parish

"Parish's short and very readable account of the history of American slavery is the one book that everyone with even a passing interest in the topic should read before anything else."
-- Choice

This study of slavery focuses initially on the drastic revisions in the historical debate on slavery and the present understanding of 'the peculiar institution'. It gives a concise explanation of the nature of American slavery and its impact on the slaves themselves and on Southern society and culture.

And it broadens our understanding of the debates among historians about slavery; compares Southern slavery with slavery elsewhere in the New World; and shows how slavery evolved and changed over time—and how it ended. Peter Parish examines some of the important recent works on slavery to identify crucial questions and basic themes and define the main areas of controversy.

Genres: History, African American, Nonfiction

208 pages, Paperback

First published June 1, 1989

Reviews

[CTEP]

Slavery: History and Historians is a nonfiction historical book by Peter J. Parish and came out in 1989. Slavery explores the nature of American slavery, the impact on the slaves themselves and on Southern society and culture. The book is mostly focused on the controversial questions and themes of slavery within America.

Just like any historical plots, Slavery: History and Historian explores the institution of slavery, the business of slavery, the lives of slaves, and past studies of slavery. This book is fascinating because Parish accumulated past studies from other historians, psychologists, and economist to explore the realm of slavery. Parish used an example of Stanley Elkin's Slavery who argued that "a tightly closed system" created a "docile but irresponsible, loyal but lazy, humble but deceitful - the stereotype of the American slaves." This argument was opposed to the first concept of the racial inferiority which explained the personality problems of the Negro slave. Another example from the studies of Elkin was his controversial analogy between the Southern slave plantation and the Nazi concentration camp. The analogy he makes is to prove the personality change within the inmates impacted by total institution. This argument was highly controversial and many historians opposed the analogy.

It was the chapter: the lives of the slaves, that I mostly focused on. This chapter introduced studies to explore the existential lives of slaves. Some arguments such as "personality changes," "sambo," and "total institution" plays a role in the development of the slaves. It was fascinating to learn the dependency of the slaves to their owners, and the owners to their slaves. They both depend on each other but for negative reasons; for example, slaves only looks up to their masters yet they fear the whip or the consequences, and the masters looks down to the slaves for economic reasons yet they are afraid of vandalism and acts of escape.

The most important theme I found within this book is fear. Fear plays role within our lives. It's inevitable. Fear played a role in the development of slavery, racism, discrimination, stereotyping, and prejudice. For example, according to Parish, by 1720, blacks outnumbered whites by almost two to one. There was increasing fear and anxiety among whites that, therefore, legislation steadily reduce black autonomy, intensified discrimination, and introduced tighter controls.

As a CTEP member I am not only exposed to my students from different part of the world but I am exposed to the continuity of racism, discrimination, violence, and even fear. The news of President Trump, the deportation of immigrants, Black Lives Matters, and post-election is still growing even after Martin Luther King's speech, "I Have A Dream." My students are scared. As a CTEP instructor, it is my job to be there for the students and to rid racism and discrimination. It is fear that causes the attitude, the behavior, the cognitive, and the words of people. To quote from the movie Apocalypto, "fear is a sickness. It will crawl into the souls of everyone who engages it."

I definitely recommend this book to my colleagues because it is a book that provides us about the past and explores the themes of fear, violence, and the impact of a total institution. To kill the suspense, racism still exists. Discrimination still exists. This book taught me why these concepts exists. It's true why many important figures taught us to love rather than to commit violence: we don't want to have a future filled with fear.

[Geicodave · Rating 5 out of 5]

Interesting survey of the historiography of American slavery. It shows how the historiography has changed in the decades since U.B. Phillips published his book. It also discusses some of the specific issues historians of the period have debated over the years and are still debating. The book's only drawback, if it can be called that, is that it was published in 1989 and thus does not take account of the literature published since then. Nevertheless, it is a good place to start for anyone interested in the historiography of slavery. The book has an excellent bibliographic essay.

[Michelle · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a solid historiography of the prior history of slavery, though is quite dated now. For a historian who perhaps does not want to read the earliest publications on slavery published in the field, this is a great overview of trends and arguments and discussions among historians on the subject.

[Blair Hodges · Rating 4 out of 5]

Though slightly dated today, Parish's overview is slightly dated today not because much has changed regarding his overview of past historical controversies and perspectives, more because he couldn't predict the future. So it offers a compelling discussion about the historiography of slavery up until the 80s. He raises interesting historical puzzles and questions which any working historian would profit from considering.

[Yulonda · Rating 3 out of 5]

Summarizes the major historiographical arguments on slavery. It was helpful for generals.

[Tyler · Rating 2 out of 5]

A dense book. Good if you are a scholar trying to get an understanding of the general sweep of the field of the history of US Slavery. Not really of much use or interest for a casual, general reader.