Thursday, June 20, 2013
Genovese's structure and style
I have not done any outside research on Roll, Jordan, Roll yet (i'm trying to save that for after I have read the book and made up some of my own opinions...) so I was wandering if someone could help me understand his structure. The biblical quotations are lost on me (my sunday-school teacher would be ashamed) and while I think the book is incredibly well-researched and thick with description, analysis, and examples, and can't help but feel that this comprehensive coverage of Slavery is jumping around all over the place.Then again i'm only 430 pages in..... Did I miss something somewhere in my rush to get cracking?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Hey Richard,
ReplyDeleteI am also holding off on reading reviews of the book until afterwards, I felt that after reading the intro I would be too skewed if I read any educated criticism of the book as I was already shying away from the arguments Genovese might be making.
Richard,
ReplyDeleteI'm only about 100 pages into the book at this point, so my answers may not be the greatest. However, thus far, I have noticed Genovese making a constant effort to demonstrate the roll played by slaves in the development of Southern society. This theme seems to be at the core of each chapter and what ties them all together. In addition, Genovese states that "slaves forged weapons of defense, the most important of which was a religion that taught them to love and value each other, to take a critical view of their masters, and to reject the ideological rationales for their enslavement." (6) This quote also seems central to the overall argument and potentially the structure. Relgion provided slaves a lens through which to critique their oppression. Therefore, the Biblical quotes at the beginning of each section could help provide the reader a similar Biblical lens through which to understand Genovese's work. We'll see how this theory pans out throughout the rest of the book...
Mark
One meaning is that he uses Scripture as a focal point that represents both the working interpretation of the slaveholders, who might have seen the Scriptures as endorsing their paternalistic role and position of power, as well as the practical and emboldened interpretation of the slaves who found in it the basis of their resistance to slavery and the means to “project their own rights and value as human beings.” (p.7) Hence, the different scriptural titles/epigraphs set the theme for the chapter (section?)following by picking out a phrase from the Scripture used under which certain aspects of the Southern slave society manifested itself, and the dynamics of how both oppression and resistance played themselves out. To a third party - the reader - the Scriptures can be seen as supporting the ways that the slaveholders wanted the slave system to work, while the Scriptures can also be seen as supporting the slaves in their resistance and thus as the basis for their creating alternate ways of transcending the oppression intended - though not completely obviously.
ReplyDeleteI am all in on the importance of Religion to this book Bryan and Mark - I am just still uncertain about the organizational structure. Somehow it feels haphazard (although thorough)....I'm off to do some research to see if I can clear this up.
ReplyDelete