The Slave Community

According to Blassingame, African culture was not entirely removed from slave culture through the process of enslavement and "was much more resistant to the bludgeons that was slavery than historians have hitherto suspected."[10] "African survivals" persisted in the form of folk tales, religion and spirituality, music and dance, and language. He asserts that the retention of African culture acted as a form of resistance to enslavement: "All things considered, the few Africans enslaved in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century America appear to have survived their traumatic experiences without becoming abjectly docile, infantile, or submissive" and "since an overwhelming percentage of nineteenth-century Southern slaves were native Americans, they never underwent this kind of shock [the Middle Passage] and were in a position to construct psychological defenses against total dependency on their masters."[11]

Blassingame asserts that historians have discussed "what could be generally described as slave 'culture,' but give little solid information on life in the quarters."[12] He argues that culture developed within the slave community independent of the slaveowners' influence. Blassingame notes, "Antebellum black slaves created several unique cultural forms which lightened their burden of oppression, promoted group solidarity, provided ways for verbalizing aggression, sustaining hope, building self-esteem, and often represented areas of life largely free from the control of whites."[13]

Blassingame argues slave music and dance (depicted here in The Old Plantation) represented forms of resistance and examples of African cultural retention

Blassingame notes that many of the folk tales told by slaves have been traced by African scholars to Ghana, Senegal, and Mauritania to peoples such as the Ewe, Wolof, Hausa, Temne, Ashanti, and Igbo. He remarks, "While many of these tales were brought over to the South, the African element appears most clearly in the animal tales." One prominent example discussed by Blassingame is the Ewe story of "Why the Hare Runs Away", which is a trickster and tar-baby tale told by southern slaves and later recorded by writer Joel Chandler Harris in his Uncle Remus stories. Southern slaves often included African animals like elephants, lions, and monkeys as characters in their folk tales.[14]

As Christian missionaries and slaveowners attempted to erase African religious and spiritual beliefs, Blassingame argues that "in the United States, many African religious rites were fused into one—voodoo." Voodoo priests and conjurers promised slaves that they could make masters kind, harm enemies, ensure love, and heal sickness. Other religious survivals noted by Blassingame include funeral rites, grave decorating, and ritualistic dancing and singing.[15]

Slaveowners and state governments tried to prevent slaves from making or playing musical instruments because of the use of drums to signal the Stono Rebellion in 1739. Blassingame, however, points out that in spite of restrictions, slaves were able to build a strong musical tradition drawing on their African heritage. Music, songs, and dances were similar to those performed or played in Africa. Instruments reproduced by slaves include drums, three-stringed banjos, gourd rattles, and mandolins.[16]

Still, Blassingame concludes that cross-cultural exchanges occurred on southern plantations, arguing that "acculturation in the United States involved the mutual interaction between two cultures, with Europeans and Africans borrowing from each other."[17] Blassingame asserts that the most significant instance revolved around Protestant Christianity (primarily Baptist and Methodist churches): "The number of blacks who received religious instruction in antebellum white churches is significant because the church was the only institution other than the plantation which played a major role in acculturating the slave."[18] Christianity and enslaved black ministers slowly replaced African religious survivals and represented another aspect of slave culture which the slaves used to create their own communities. While ministers preached obedience in the presence of the slaveowners and other whites, slaves often met in secret, "invisible" services unsupervised by whites. In these "invisible churches", slaves could discuss freedom, liberty, and the judgment of God against slaveowners.[19]

Slave marriages were illegal in southern states, and slave couples were frequently separated by slaveowners through sale. Blassingame grants that slaveowners did have control over slave marriages. They encouraged monogamous relationships to "make it easier to discipline their slaves. ... A black man, they reasoned, who loved his wife and his children was less likely to be rebellious or to run away than would a 'single' slave."[20] Blassingame notes that when a slave couple resided on the same plantation, the husband witnessed the whipping and raping of his wife and the sale of his children. He remarks, "Nothing demonstrated his powerlessness as much as the slave's inability to prevent the forcible sale of his wife and children."[21]

Nevertheless, Blassingame argues that "however frequently the family was broken it was primarily responsible for the slave's ability to survive on the plantation without becoming totally dependent on and submissive to his master."[20] He contends:

While the form of family life in the quarters differed radically from that among free Negroes and whites, this does not mean it failed to perform many of the traditional functions of the family—the rearing of children being one of the most important of these functions. Since slave parents were primarily responsible for training their children, they could cushion the shock of bondage for them, help them to understand their situation, teach them values different from those their masters tried to instill in them, and give them a referent for self-esteem other than the master.[20]

Blassingame asserts that slave parents attempted to shield infants and young children from the brutality of the plantation. When children understood that they were enslaved (usually after their first whipping), parents dissuaded angry urges to run away or seek revenge.[22]

Children observed fathers demonstrating two behavioral types. In the quarters, he "acted like a man", castigating whites for the mistreatment of himself and his family; in the field working for the master, he appeared obedient and submissive. According to Blassingame, "Sometimes children internalized both the true personality traits and the contradictory behavioral patterns of their parents." He believes that children recognized submissiveness as a convenient method to avoid punishment and the behavior in the quarters as the true behavioral model.[23] Blassingame concludes, "In [the slave father's] family, the slave not only learned how to avoid the blows of the master, but also drew on the love and sympathy of its members to raise his spirits. The family was, in short, an important survival mechanism."[24]

Blassingame identifies three stereotypes in the literature of the antebellum south:

• Sambo was a combination of the Uncle Remus, Jim Crow, and Uncle Tom figures who represented the faithful, submissive, and superstitious slave.
• Jack worked faithfully until he was mistreated, then he became uncooperative and occasionally rebellious. Rationally analyzing the white man's overwhelming physical power, Jack either avoided contact with him or was deferential in his presence.
• Nat was the perpetual runaway and rebellious slave feared by slaveowners. Named after Nat Turner, the Nat character retaliated against slaveowners and was subdued and punished only when overcome by greater numbers.[25]

Directly challenging Elkins's infantilization thesis, Blassingame argues that historians have focused too much on the Sambo personality type and the role of paternalism.[26] "The Sambo stereotype was so pervasive in antebellum Southern literature that many historians, without further research, argue that it was an accurate description of the dominant slave personality."[27]

Blassingame argues that the loyal and devoted slave was less common than historians previously believed

According to Blassingame, the Sambo figure evolved from white Americans' attitudes toward Africans and African Americans as innately barbaric, passive, superstitious, and childlike. Southern writers felt a need to defend slavery from allegations of abuse and brutality leveled by northern abolitionists, so Sambo became a common portrayal to justify and explain the need for plantation paternalism. Finally, slaveowners used the Sambo stereotype to alleviate their own fears and anxieties about the potential rebelliousness of their slaves.[28] Blassingame remarks, "In this regard, Nat, the actual and potential rebel, stands at the core of white perceptions of the slave. With Nat perennially in the wings, the creation of Sambo was almost mandatory for the Southerner's emotional security. Like a man whistling in the dark to bolster his courage, the white man had to portray the slave as Sambo."[29]

Despite slaveowner paternalism and charges of submissiveness, Blassingame contends, "There is overwhelming evidence, in the primary sources, of the Negro's resistance to his bondage and of his undying love for freedom."[30] Blassingame outlines efforts of slaves to run away and rebel, particularly the Stono Rebellion of 1739, Charles Deslondes's revolt in 1811, Nat Turner's revolt of 1831, and the participation of fugitive slaves in Florida fighting with Seminoles during the Seminole Wars.[31] Blassingame concludes that the Sambo and Nat stereotypes "were real." He explains, "The more fear whites had of Nat, the more firmly tried to believe in Sambo in order to escape paranoia."[32]

Blassingame concludes that there were a variety of personality types exhibited by slaves positioned on a scale between the two extremes of Sambo and Nat. He argues that variations present in plantations, overseers, and masters gave the slave "much more freedom from restraint and more independence and autonomy than his institutionally defined role allowed. Consequently, the slave did not have to be infantile or abjectly docile in order to remain alive."[33] Blassingame compares slavery on southern plantations to the treatment of prisoners in Nazi concentration camps in an effort to demonstrate that "the most important factor in causing infantilism, total dependency, and docility in the camps was the real threat of death which left few, if any, alternatives for the inmates."[34] He remarks, "Placed on a continuum of total institutions, the concentration camp is far removed from the Southern plantation."[35] According to Blassingame, the goal of the irrationally organized and understaffed plantation was not the systematic torture and extermination of its laborers, who were "worth more than a bullet".[35]

In The History Teacher, Keith Polakoff comments that "only with the publication of Blassingame's work do we obtain for the first time a detailed examination of the daily lives of the slaves on large plantations, with some intelligent speculation about the forces to which they were subjected.[48] David Goldfield writes in Agricultural History that the book was the most impressive and balanced attempt to understand the slave's responses to plantation life to date.[49] Carl N. Degler writes in the Washington Post that Blassingame's study comes "closer than any previous study to answering the question 'what was it like to be a slave?'"[50]

Still, Blassingame's conclusions, methodology, and sources received substantial criticism from historians. Marian DeB. Kilson's review in the American Historical Review described Blassingame's aims as "imperfectly realized" because he "lacks a clear analytical perspective". She found his discussion of slave personality types "fascinating" and "his methodological aims ... important" but "not systematically pursued". Kilson believes that Blassingame ultimately failed in his analysis because "his intellectual integration of social and psychological orientations has yet to be fully achieved."[51] Orville W. Taylor contends in the Journal of Negro History that Blassingame had a tendency to overgeneralize and make "unsubstantiatable claims to originality and uniqueness".[52]

In the Journal of Political Economy, economic historian Stanley L. Engerman complains that the book is not "written by or for economists" and makes "limited use of economic analysis". He continues, "Given the concern with the 'personal autonomy' and culture of the slave, much of the book is devoted to the African heritage; to slave music, religion, and folklore; and to the discussion of the slave family and other personal relationships." Engerman concedes that The Slave Community "is a book written at a time of transition in the interpretation of slavery and black culture", but "the author at times seems unsure of the direction in which he is pointing." He concludes that Blassingame's "analysis is incomplete in its presentation of a different and more complex scene" even though he "effectively shows the difficulties of the concentration-camp image and the Sambo myth".[53]

Historians criticized Blassingame for dismissing the WPA slave interviews and relying solely on fugitive slave narratives. In the Journal of American History, Willie Lee Rose writes that Blassingame's use of the fugitive slave narratives is marred by his neglect of the WPA interviews.[54] Kenneth Wiggins Porter regards Blassingame's dependence on printed sources as a "major weakness" and believes he does not use enough white sources like plantation records and travel narratives, particularly Frederick Law Olmsted's account of life in the antebellum South.[55] According to George Rawick, "We desperately need work that depicts and analyzes the lives of black women under slavery. We have had very largely a male-dominated literature about slavery." He notes, "Blassingame, unfortunately, does not help us at all in this task." Rawick surmises that if Blassingame had consulted the WPA slave interviews, he would have developed a picture of the "heroic struggles of black women on behalf of themselves and of the whole black community".[56]

Historians exhibited varying responses to Blassingame's use of psychological theory. In a review in the William and Mary Quarterly, George Mullin is especially critical of Blassingame's use of psychology, stating that Blassingame "reduc[es] slave behavior and culture to a question of roles and psychological characteristics". He concludes that an "E. P. Thompson for the American Black community during slavery is still off-stage", and that the topic needs exploration by a social or economic historian.[57] Rawick states that Blassingame's "first major error lies in adopting the very questionable deterministic social psychological role theories associated with ... Erving Goffman and Harry Stack Sullivan." He complains that it "parodies the basic complexity of the 'psychology' of the oppressed who simultaneously view themselves in socially negative terms while struggling against the view of themselves and their behavior". Rawick is convinced that Blassingame would have reached the same conclusions from the sources without the use of psychology "because the historical evidence as seen through an unadulterated commitment to the struggles of the slaves and an equally uncompromising hostility to the masters would have led him there."[58] On the other hand, Eugene D. Genovese and Earl E. Thorpe praised Blassingame for his use of psychological theory, but admit they prefer Freudian and Marxist interpretations over Sullivanian theory.[59][60]

In 1976, the Association for the Study of Afro-American Life and History met in Chicago and held a session on The Slave Community. Panelists included Mary Frances Berry, Herbert Gutman, Leslie Howard Owens, George Rawick, Earl Thorpe, and Eugene Genovese. Blassingame responded to questions and critiques from the panel. The discussion led to the publication of an anthology edited by Al-Tony Gilmore called Revisiting Blassingame's The Slave Community: The Scholars Respond (1978). The book includes essays by the panelists as well as James D. Anderson, Ralph D. Carter, John Henrik Clarke, and Stanley Engerman. Blassingame's essay, "Redefining The Slave Community: A Response to Critics" appears in the volume.[61]

Since its publication in 1972 and revision in 1979, The Slave Community has influenced subsequent historiographical works on slavery in the United States. In a 1976 edition of Roll, Jordan, Roll, Eugene Genovese explains that Blassingame's book "demonstrates that the published accounts of runaway slaves can be illuminating".[62] The authors of Reckoning with Slavery (1976) use Blassingame's findings to challenge the assertions of Robert William Fogel and Stanley Engerman in Time on the Cross: The Economics of American Negro Slavery (1974).[63] In Slave Religion: The "Invisible Institution" in the Antebellum South (1978), Albert J. Raboteau comments, "We should speak of the 'invisibility' of slave religion with irony: it is the neglect of slave sources by historians which has been the main cause of this invisibility." Raboteau credits Blassingame and others for demonstrating the value of slave sources.[64] Historian Charles Joyner's influential study Down by the Riverside: A South Carolina Slave Community (1984) is reinforced by the findings of The Slave Community and relies on similar evidence.[65]

Historian Deborah Gray White builds on Blassingame's research of the family life of the slaves in Ar'n't I a Woman?: Female Slaves in the Plantation South (1985). Her argument is similar to Blassingame's: "This present study takes a look at slave women in America and argues that they were not submissive, subordinate, or prudish and that they were not expected to be so."[66] White discusses the Mammy and Jezebel stereotypes often applied to African American women by white Americans. She calls The Slave Community "a classic" but remarks that "Blassingame stressed the fact that many masters recognized the male as the head of the family. He observed that during courtship men flattered women and exaggerated their prowess. There was, however, little discussion of the reciprocal activities of slave women." She concludes that Blassingame "described how slave men gained status in the family, but he did not do the same for women."[67]

Elizabeth Fox-Genovese makes similar observations in Within the Plantation Household: Black and White Women of the Old South (1988). She notes that The Slave Community, like other historiography produced in the 1960s and 70s, "did not directly address women's history, even though many of the historians were sensitive to women's experience. Most of the male authors had done a large part of their work before the development of women's history as a discipline, and even the most sensitive were hampered by a paucity of sources and by unfamiliarity with the questions feminists would soon raise."[68]