Saturday, June 22, 2013
Paternalism - Genovese/Wood
Genovese seems to believe that the relationship that slave holders have to slaves is similar to how Wood describes the relationship between the monarchy in England to the colonists. The former sees themselves as benevolent paternalists who knows what is best for the latter. Even though Wood argued how paternalism kind of died out after the revolution, Genovese depicts how the system was still present.
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Purav,
ReplyDeleteI think you make a good point drawing comparison between Wood and Genovese. I think Genovese provides a strong argument against Wood. As we discussed in class, Wood seems greatly overlook slavery when discussing the development of a more egalitarian society in America. Wood argues that while slavery survived the Revolution, that it helped create the necessary mindset which would undermine slavery later on and would cause people to begin questioning it. However, Genovese makes it appear as though the paternal system had significantly more lasting power than Wood contends. Although groups did begin debating slavery, it appears as though many of the slaveholder genuinely believed in the paternal society that they were a part of.
Mark
This is an interesting point. The colonist did seem to transfer what they knew as a society based on the paternalistic ideals they learned from the sovereign/subject relationship to that of the master/slave relationship. This is yet another irony found in the early republic that was based on "liberty."
ReplyDeleteMy reading left me with the understanding that, according to Genovese, paternalism grew up later as a way to reform and justify the master/slave relationship. Instead of being learned it was decided upon. Did anyone else find this in the reading or did I get lost in the book somewhere?
ReplyDeleteYates, I agree with your point, that paternalism in "Roll, Jordan, Roll" was a system that the slaveholders used to "discipline and morally justify a system of exploitation." (p. 4) But Genovese also points out that the paternalism in the Old South was "intersected with and acquired enormous reinforcement from ... an analytically distinct system of racial subordination." (p. 6) And to your point Purav, Wood does say that there was a "liberalization of paternal authority" (p. 161 in Wood)that the colonists were experiencing in the 18th century. It seems, though I could not find a statement in Wood, that perhaps between the two authors, slavery as a distinct system per Genovese "arrived" momentously in the history of the southern states after Revolution to "revive" if not maintain the system of exploitation of slave labor, even though there were groups of citizens who were strongly abolitionist... predominantly in the north.
ReplyDeleteMark - I didn't necessarily see the paternalism presented by Genovese as opposed to Wood. Instead, I read these arguments as supportive of a larger air of paternalism that both defined and informed "early" American social relations. With, as Bryan says, the "distinct system of racial subordination" adding to the complex nature of social relations between slave and slave-owner, overseer etc.
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