The World They Made Together : : Black and White Values in Eighteenth-Century Virginia / / Mechal Sobel.

• Superior document: Title is part of eBook package: De Gruyter EBOOK PACKAGE COMPLETE 2021 English
• VerfasserIn: Sobel, Mechal,
• Place / Publishing House: Princeton, NJ : : Princeton University Press, , [2021]; ©1987
• Year of Publication: 2021
• Language: English
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (388 p.)

In the recent past, enormous creative energy has gone into the study of American slavery, with major explorations of the extent to which African culture affected the culture of black Americans and with an almost totally new assessment of slave culture as Afro-American. Accompanying this new awareness of the African values brought into America, however, is an automatic assumption that white traditions influenced black ones. In this view, although the institution of slaver is seen as important, blacks are not generally treated as actors nor is their "divergent culture" seen as having had a wide-ranging effect on whites. Historians working in this area generally assume two social systems in America, one black and one white, and cultural divergence between slaves and masters.It is the thesis of this book that blacks, Africans, and Afro-Americans, deeply influenced white's perceptions, values, and identity, and that although two world views existed, there was a deep symbiotic relatedness that must be explored if we are to understand either or both of them. This exploration raises many questions and suggests many possibilities and probabilities, but it also establishes how thoroughly whites and blacks intermixed within the system of slavery and how extensive was the resulting cultural interaction.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter -- Contents -- List of Illustrations -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction -- Part One. Attitudes Toward Time and Work -- 1. World Views in England and West Africa -- 2. English and African Perceptions of Time -- 3. Afro-American Attitudes -- 4. Shared English and African Experiences of Work -- 5. Anglo-American Attitudes -- 6. Conclusions -- Part Two. Attitudes Toward Space and the Natural World -- 7. African and English Attitudes -- 8. Black and White Visions in and of America -- 9. Sharing Space Inside the Little House -- 10. Sharing Space Inside the Big House -- 11. Naming the Inhabitants -- 12. Conclusions -- Part Three. Understandings of Causality and Purpose -- 13. African and English Explanations of Death and the Afterlife -- 14. The Awakening to the Spirit in Virginia -- 15. The Later Fruits of the Great Awakening -- 16. Attitudes Toward Death and the Afterlife in Virginia -- 17. Conclusions -- Part Four. Coda -- 18. Coherent World Views -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index