Course: HIST. 7880
Professor: Dr. Arwin D. Smallwood, Office: 121 Mitchell Hall, Phone (901)
678-3869, asmallwd@memphis.edu.
HIST. 7880
Course Description
This course will explore African-American history from the colonial period to
the early antebellum period. It will attempt to explore aspects of the
transition of Africans to African Americans within the contexts of
simultaneously evolving institutions of slavery. Special emphasis will be placed
on questions of creolization and the intersection of various groups (Africans,
Native Americans, and Europeans) and cultures (the sugar culture of the
Caribbean, the Tobacco culture of the Chesapeake, the rice and indigo cultures
of the Carolinas, and the Cotton culture of the “Lower” or “Deep South.”). It
will also examine the evolution of slave law, relations between Africans, Native
Americans and Europeans, the impact of the American Revolution on Blacks, and
the institutionalization of slavery during the antebellum period. The course
will also look at slave resistance, the rise of the domestic slave trade and the
rise of the anti-slavery and colonization movements in the United States. While
our focus will be mainly on the North American mainland and particularly the
American South, we will contextualize this domain by spending a few weeks in the
wider Atlantic region, including the Caribbean and Latin America.
Course Objective
Our major tasks include:
1. Understanding the evolution of slavery in America from the colonial period to
its eventual institutionalization in the early antebellum period
2. Exploring creolization as an element of the African-American experience
within the contexts of slavery and the African Diaspora
3. Formulating a comprehensive narrative for the periods that consider the
impact of Blacks on culture, law, and politics in the Caribbean and the Americas
during the colonial and the early antebellum periods.
Course Format
Our class discussions will center around three questions: What is the author’s
argument? How does the author make this argument? Does the author make this
argument effectively? To participate successfully in this endeavor, besides
reading the assigned monograph of the week, you should arrive in class with
written notes that help you identify, dissect, and evaluate the author’s
argument. Courteous, professional codes of conduct should prevail in class. You
will also write weekly book reviews of each monograph (See below for further
information about writing assignments).
Required books:
Aptheker, Herbert. American Negro Slave Revolts.
Bancroft, Frederic. Slave Trading in the Old South.
Dunn, Richard S. Sugar and Slaves.
Filler, Louis. Crusade against Slavery.
Forbes, Jack D. Africans and Native American.
Klein, Herbert. African Slavery in Latin America and the Caribbean.
Kulikoff, Allan. Tobacco and Slaves.
Littlefield, Daniel. Rice and Slaves in Colonial South Carolina.
Price, Richard. Maroon Societies.
Quarles, Benjamin. The Negro in the American Revolution 3rd ed
Quarles, Benjamin. Black Abolitionist.
Stampp, Kenneth. The Peculiar Institution.
Cohen, David W. and Jack P. Greene eds. Neither Slave nor Free.
Gallay, Alan. The Indian Slave Trade.
Inikori, Joseph E. and Stanley L. Engerman. eds. The Atlantic Slave
Trade.
Moore, John Hebron, The Emergence of the Cotton Kingdom
in the Old Southwest.
Required Articles:
Arwin D. Smallwood, “A History of Native American and African Relations From
1502 to 1900,“ Negro History Bulletin (April-Sept. 1999)
William S. Willis, “Divide and Rule: Red, White and Black in the Southeast,”
Journal of Negro History 48 (July 1963)
Sanford Winston, “Indian Slavery in the North Carolina Region,” Journal of
Negro History 19 (October 1934)
Jerome S. Handler, “The Amerindian Slave Population of Barbados” in the
Seventeenth and Early Eighteenth Centuries,” Caribbean Studies 8 (1969)
Kenneth W. Porter, “Relations between Negroes and Indians within the Present
Limits of the United States,” Journal of Negro History 17 (July 1932)
Kathryn E. Holland Braund, “The Creek Indians, Blacks and Slavery,” The
Journal of Southern History 57 (November 1991)
James W. Covington, “Some Observations Concerning the Florida-Carolina Indian
Slave Trade,” Florida Anthropologist 20 (1967)
Ariela J. Gross, “Of Portuguese Origin”: Litigating Identity and Citizenship
among the “Little Races” in Nineteenth-Century America” Law and History
Review Fall 2007, vol. 25, no. 3
Alriela J. Gross, The Caucasian Cloak”: Mexican Americans and the Politics of
Whiteness in the Twentieth-Century Southwest” The Georgetown Law Journal
vol. 95, no. 2 January 2007
Edward T. Price, “A Geographic Analysis of White-Negro-Indian Racial Mixtures in
Eastern United States,” Association of American Geographers Annals 43
(June 1953)
*All of the books should be available in the university bookstore. Students
should search for articles using JSTOR.
Grading
The grading scale basically follows the departmental standards for graduate
students, with a focus upon those getting or considering getting their
doctorate:
A: Outstanding, excellent work: approaches the quality and demonstrates the
potential for professional quality work.
A-: Very good work. High quality performance, but falls short of excellence.
B+: Good Work. Solid effort shows potential for higher achievement.
B: Needs improvement: Reflects serious effort, but raises doubts about the
potential for achieving professional quality, so students should consult with
professors about how to improve their work, especially if they are in the Ph.D.
program or would like to be.
B-: Marginal. A few positive qualities, but plagued by serious problems that
must be immediately addressed.
C+ and below: unacceptable.
I will not write grades on every review, but I will provide feedback and we will
have individual discussions throughout the semester about your progress and
performance. Grades are based upon the quality of your written work and your
participation in class discussions.
Writing Assignments
Weekly Reviews
You will write professional-quality reviews of the books. Reviews should answer
the same three questions that we will address in class discussions. The reviews
should not have a title page; only the bibliographic information should appear
at the top of the page. Reviews of a single book should be 500-600 words.
Reviews of two books should be 800-1000 words. The reviews are always due the
week after we have discussed the book. I have provided a list of guidelines
below, paraphrased from Richard Marius, A Short Guide to Writing About History
that are helpful for producing quality reviews:
1. Always give the author’s purpose in writing the book. This idea is often best
addressed in the preface or introduction, which you should always read
super-extra-carefully.
2. Summarize the author’s evidence. Look through the notes section.
3. Focus on the book, not its author. Avoid such clichés as deeming the author
“well-qualified.”
4. The review should not entirely focus on style issues. Avoid prolonged
comments on the style of the book. However, one can note whether a book is
well-written or incoherent, and one can even quote a sentence to illustrate an
author’s style.
5. Show, don’t tell. Avoid such generalizations as, “The book is very
interesting,” or “The book is very boring.” A good review will illustrate your
opinions without using such banalities.
6. Be courteous. Passionate attacks reflect poorly upon the reviewer.
Professional scholarship demands a level of detachment and comportment.
7. Quote judiciously. The author’s prose may spice up your review, and it may
deliver an idea more sharply than you can through paraphrasing. But it is your
job to analyze the book, and you shirk that duty if you include too many long
quotations.
8. Do not feel compelled to say negative things about the book. One should note
important inaccuracies, disagreements over interpretations, problems with the
evidence, major stylistic issues, and so on. But avoid petty complaints about an
insignificant detail or an isolated typographical error.
9. Accept the book on its own terms. You may wish that the author wrote a
different book, but you must review whether the author has succeeded in
accomplishing his or her goal.
10. Place the book in historical context. How does this book contribute to our
understanding of African American history?
Once during the semester, you will be asked to distribute copies of your review
to the class, and you will read it out loud, so that the class can revisit the
themes you highlight and assess your review. For examples of professional
reviews, consult any major journal such as Journal of American History. Remember
that one can competently review a book based upon a careful reading, a
familiarity with the historical and historiographical issues, and a cogent
presentation of ideas.
Final Paper
Also, at the end of the semester, you will be expected to write a thematic
bibliographic essay (15-20 pages) on a particular theme covered by the core and
supplemental readings on the weekly schedule. Along with the readings listed
each student should conduct an OCLC search for all Books, articles, Theses,
Dissertations, and primary materials related to their chosen topic, This
bibliographic essay should have a unifying argument expressed through a thesis
statement.
Schedule
Week 1 Introduction
(Reading these survey texts, if you have not already, should provide you with
the proper foundation for this course)
Leadership Pamphlet
Michael L. Coniff, Africans in the Americas.
John Hope Franklin, From Slavery to Freedom
Arwin D. Smallwood, The Atlas of African-American History and Politics
Week 2 African Slavery in the Caribbean and Latin America
Core Reading: Joseph E. Inikori and Stanley L. Engerman. eds. The
Atlantic Slave Trade.
Herbert S. Klein, African Slavery in Latin America and
the Caribbean
Supplemental: Robert B. Toplin, Slavery and Race Relations in Latin
America
Barbara Bush, Slave Women in Caribbean Society, 1650-1838
Darlene Clark Hine and David Barry Gaspar, eds., More Than Chattel: Black
Women and Slavery in the Americas
Week 3 Slave Resistance in the Caribbean and Latin America
Core Reading: Richard Price, Maroon Societies: Rebel Slave Communities
in the Americas
Supplemental: Peter M. Voelz, Slave and Soldier: The Military Impact
of Blacks in the Colonial Americas
Eugene D. Genovese, From Rebellion to Revolution: Afro-American Slave
Revolts in the Making of the Modern World
Gary Y. Okihiro, ed., In Resistance: Studies in African, Caribbean and
Afro-American History
Week 4 Africans, Native Americans, Europeans and the Creolization of the
Caribbean, Latin America and North America 1502 to 1680
Core Readings: Jack D. Forbes, Africans and Native Americans: The
Language of Race and the Evolution of Red-Black Peoples
Article
Arwin D. Smallwood, “A History of Native American and African Relations from
1502 to 1900, “Negro History Bulletin (April-Sept. 1999)
Supplemental: Kim Dramer, Native Americans and Black Americans
Laurence Foster, Negro-Indian Relationships in the Southeast
Wilcomb Washburn, The Governor and the Rebel: A History of Bacons Rebellion
in Virginia
Article
Kenneth W. Porter, “Relations between Negroes and Indians within the Present
Limits of the United States,” Journal of Negro History 17 (July 1932)
Week 5 Sugar and Rum: Colonial Slavery in the British Caribbean
Core Readings: Richard S. Dunn, Sugar and Slaves: The Rise of the
Planter Class in the English West Indies, 1624-1713
Supplemental: Clifford Lindsey Alderman, Rum, Slaves and Molasses: The
Story of New England’s Triangular Trade
Week 6 The Rise of the Tobacco Culture of the Upper South:
Colonial Slavery in the Chesapeake
Core Readings: Allan Kulikoff, Tobacco and Slaves: The Development of
Southern Cultures in the Chesapeake, 1680-1800
Supplemental: Mechal Sobel, The World They Made Together: Black and
White Values in Eighteenth Century Virginia
Week 7 The Rise of Rice and Indigo Culture of the Lower South: Colonial
Slavery in the Carolinas
Core Readings: Daniel Littlefield, Rice and Slaves in Colonial South
Carolina
Supplemental: Peter Wood, Black Majority
Judith A Carney, Black Rice: The Origins of Rice Cultivation in the Americas
Week 8 The Role of Native Americans and Africans in the rise of
English Colonial Slavery
Core Readings: Allan Gallay, The Indian Slave Trade and the Rise of
the English
Jerome S. Handler, “The Amerindian Slave Population of Barbados” in the
Seventeenth and Early Eighteenth Centuries,” Caribbean Studies 8 (1969)
Supplemental: Kim Dramer, Native Americans and Black Americans
Cynthia Cumfer, Separate Peoples, One Land: The Minds of Cherokees, Blacks,
and Whites on the Tennessee Frontier
Brent N. Kennedy, The Melungeons: The Resurrection of a Proud People: An
Untold Story of Ethnic Cleansing in America
Gerald M. Sider, Lumbee Indian Histories: Race, Ethnicity and Indian Identity
in the Southern United States
Brewton Berry, Almost White
Edward T. Price, Mixed-blooded Populations of Eastern United States: As
to its Origins, Localizations and Persistence (Ph.D. Diss.)
Articles
Kathryn E. Holland Braund, “The Creek Indians, Blacks and Slavery,” The
Journal of Southern History 57 (November 1991)
James W. Covington, “Some Observations Concerning the Florida-Carolina Indian
Slave Trade,” Florida Anthropologist 20 (1967)
William S. Willis, “Divide and Rule: Red White and Black in the Southeast,”
Journal of Negro History 48 (July 1963)
Sanford Winston, “Indian Slavery in the North Carolina Region,” Journal of
Negro History 19 (October 1934)
Edward T. Price, “A Geographic Analysis of White-Negro-Indian Racial Mixtures in
Eastern United States,” Association of American Geographers Annals 43
(June 1953)
Week 9 The Evolution of English Slave law in North America
Core Readings: Ariela J. Gross, “Of Portuguese Origin”: Litigating
Identity and Citizenship among the “Little Races” in Nineteenth-Century America”
Law and History Review Fall 2007, vol. 25, no. 3
Alriela J. Gross, The Caucasian Cloak”: Mexican Americans and the Politics of
Whiteness in the Twentieth-Century Southwest” The Georgetown Law Journal
vol. 95, no. 2 January 2007
Supplemental: Edward Countryman, How did American Slavery Begin
Marion G. McDougall. Fugitive Slaves and Slavery in the Americas 1619-1865.
Sharon Block. Rape and Sexual Power in Early America
Lauren Benton. Law and Colonial Cultures
Don E. Fehrenbacher, Slavery, Law and Politics: The Dred Scott Case in
Historical Perspective
Winthrop Jordan, White Over Black
Sally E. Hadden. Slave Patrols: Law and Violence in Virginia and the
Carolinas
John Ruston Pagan. Anne Orthwood’s Bastard: Sex and Law in Early Virginia
Week 10 Slavery and the American Revolution
Core Reading: Benjamin Quarles, The Negro in the American Revolution,
3rd ed,
Supplemental: Wilson, Ellen Gibson, The Loyal Blacks
James Walker W. S. G., The Black Loyalist: The Search for a Promised Land in
Nova Scotia and Sierra Leone, 1783-1870.
Ira Berlin, and Ronald Hoffman, eds. Slavery and Freedom in the Age of
the American Revolution.
Week 11 The “Peculiar Institution:” The Institutionalization of Slavery
and the Africanization of the American South
Core Readings: Kenneth M. Stampp, The Peculiar Institution: Slavery in
the Ante-Bellum South
David W. Cohen and Jack P. Greene, eds., Neither Slave
nor Free; The Freedman of African Descent in the Slave Societies of the New
World
Supplemental: Julie P. Baker, Black Slavery Among the American Indians
Loren Schweninger, Black Property Owners in the South, 1790-1915
Don E. Fehrenbacher, Slave Holding Republic
John Blassingame The Slave Community
Week 12 Slave Resistance: Revolts, Work Stoppages and Running Away
Core Reading: Herbert Aptheker, American Negro Slave Revolts, 6th ed.
Benjamin Quarles. Black Abolitionist.
Supplemental: Charles L. Blockson, The Underground Railroad
Stephanie M. H. Camp, Closer to Freedom: Enslaved Women and Everyday
Resistance in the Plantation South
John Hope Franklin and Loren Schweninger, Runaway Slaves: Rebels of the
Plantation
John Lofton, Denmark Vesey’s Revolt: The Slave Plot That Lit a Fuse to Fort
Sumter
Robert S. Starobin, ed., Denmark Vesey: The Slave Conspiracy of 1822
Kenneth S. Greenberg, ed., The Confessions of Nat Turner and Related
Documents
Henry Irving Tragle, The Southampton Slave Revolt of 1831: A Compilation
of Source Material, Including the Full Text of The Confessions of Nat Turner
Benjamin Quarles, Allies for Freedom: Blacks and John Brown
Jeffrey S. Rossbach, Ambivalent Conspirators: John Brown, The Secret Six, and
a Theory of Slave Violence
Week 13 The “Cotton Kingdom” and the Domestic Slave Trade
Core Readings: John Hebron Moore, The Emergence of the Cotton Kingdom.
Frederic Bancroft, Slave Trading in the Old South
Supplemental: John Hebron Moore, The Emergence of the Cotton Kingdom
in the Old Southwest: Mississippi, 1770-1860
Harold D. Woodman, King Cotton and His Retainers: Financing and Marketing
the Cotton Crop of the South, 1800-1925
Phillip S. Foner, History of Black Americans from the Emergence of the Cotton
Kingdom to the Eve of the Compromise of 1850
Week 14 The rise of the Antislavery movement and Colonization
Core Reading: Louis Filler, Crusade against Slavery, 1830-1860
Supplemental: William Lloyd Garrison, Thoughts on
Colonization
Tom W. Shick, Behold the Promised Land: A History of Afro-American Settler
Society in Nineteenth-Century Liberia
Mary S. Locke, Anti-Slavery in America from the Introduction of African
Slaves to the Prohibition of the Slave Trade (1619-1808)
Emma J. Lapsansky-Werner ed. Back to Africa
Marion G. McDougall, Fugitive Slaves (1619-1865)
P.J. Staudenraus, The African Colonization Movement, 1816-1865
Rosalie Schwartz, Across the Rio to Freedom: U.S. Negroes in Mexico
Leon Litwack, North of Slavery 1700 to 1860
Week 15 Bibliographic Essay Due