William Dusinberre
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- January 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780195326031
- eISBN:
- 9780199868308
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195326031.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, American History: 19th Century
This book examines both the social and the political history of slavery. James Polk — President of the United States from 1845 to 1849 — owned a Mississippi cotton plantation with about fifty slaves. ...
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This book examines both the social and the political history of slavery. James Polk — President of the United States from 1845 to 1849 — owned a Mississippi cotton plantation with about fifty slaves. Drawing upon previously unexplored records, this book recreates the world of Polk's Mississippi plantation and the personal histories of his slaves, in what is arguably the most careful and vivid account to date of how slavery functioned on a single cotton plantation. Life at the Polk estate was brutal and often short. Fewer than one in two slave children lived to the age of fifteen, a child mortality rate even higher than that on the average plantation. A steady stream of slaves temporarily fled the plantation throughout Polk's tenure as absentee slavemaster. Yet Polk was in some respects an enlightened owner, instituting an unusual incentive plan for his slaves and granting extensive privileges to his most favored slave. By contrast with Senator John C. Calhoun, President Polk has been seen as a moderate Southern Democratic leader. But this book suggests that the president's political stance toward slavery — influenced as it was by his deep personal involvement in the plantation system — may actually have helped to precipitate the Civil War that Polk sought to avoid.Less
This book examines both the social and the political history of slavery. James Polk — President of the United States from 1845 to 1849 — owned a Mississippi cotton plantation with about fifty slaves. Drawing upon previously unexplored records, this book recreates the world of Polk's Mississippi plantation and the personal histories of his slaves, in what is arguably the most careful and vivid account to date of how slavery functioned on a single cotton plantation. Life at the Polk estate was brutal and often short. Fewer than one in two slave children lived to the age of fifteen, a child mortality rate even higher than that on the average plantation. A steady stream of slaves temporarily fled the plantation throughout Polk's tenure as absentee slavemaster. Yet Polk was in some respects an enlightened owner, instituting an unusual incentive plan for his slaves and granting extensive privileges to his most favored slave. By contrast with Senator John C. Calhoun, President Polk has been seen as a moderate Southern Democratic leader. But this book suggests that the president's political stance toward slavery — influenced as it was by his deep personal involvement in the plantation system — may actually have helped to precipitate the Civil War that Polk sought to avoid.
Martin Ruef
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- October 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780691162775
- eISBN:
- 9781400852642
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Princeton University Press
- DOI:
- 10.23943/princeton/9780691162775.003.0005
- Subject:
- Sociology, Politics, Social Movements and Social Change
This chapter examines how Southern blacks and whites confronted categorical—as well as classical—uncertainty, as the maintenance of plantation agriculture proved increasingly untenable. Social ...
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This chapter examines how Southern blacks and whites confronted categorical—as well as classical—uncertainty, as the maintenance of plantation agriculture proved increasingly untenable. Social networks among emancipated slaves served as a key impetus to mobilization toward alternative organizational arrangements. The plantation had been developed on the assumption that its workforce was geographically immobile unless moved or sold by plantation owners and that kinship ties among slaves could be largely ignored in allocating and exchanging slave labor. When these assumptions were challenged by emancipation, large numbers of former slaves migrated in search of family members, guided by bits of news from kin or other members of the black community. The new agricultural forms created to replace the wage plantation also tended to have a foundation in familial networks, as black sharecroppers and rental farmers largely recruited labor on the basis of kinship ties.Less
This chapter examines how Southern blacks and whites confronted categorical—as well as classical—uncertainty, as the maintenance of plantation agriculture proved increasingly untenable. Social networks among emancipated slaves served as a key impetus to mobilization toward alternative organizational arrangements. The plantation had been developed on the assumption that its workforce was geographically immobile unless moved or sold by plantation owners and that kinship ties among slaves could be largely ignored in allocating and exchanging slave labor. When these assumptions were challenged by emancipation, large numbers of former slaves migrated in search of family members, guided by bits of news from kin or other members of the black community. The new agricultural forms created to replace the wage plantation also tended to have a foundation in familial networks, as black sharecroppers and rental farmers largely recruited labor on the basis of kinship ties.
Timothy Fitzgerald
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- January 2008
- ISBN:
- 9780195300093
- eISBN:
- 9780199868636
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195300093.003.0007
- Subject:
- Religion, Religion and Literature
In this early‐seventeenth‐century collection of travel writings we can see tensions between Religion as Christian Truth on the one hand, and the beginnings of a generic concept of religions matched ...
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In this early‐seventeenth‐century collection of travel writings we can see tensions between Religion as Christian Truth on the one hand, and the beginnings of a generic concept of religions matched by an ambiguously modern secular ethnographic style on the other. This work of “pilgrimage” reflects the competition for trade and the processes of colonization, alongside the development of new ways of classifying the world and its contents. Purchas frames his whole work in Biblical terms, drawing explicitly on the expulsion of Adam and Eve, the Flood, and the Tower of Babel as explanatory concepts for the bewildering variety of newly discovered forms of human life. Yet an ironic and quite frequent application of “religions” to “superstitions” at times suggests an early if ambiguous generic modern usage, as if he is adopting a secular high ground. The world is most certainly “profane” in the sense of “fallen”; yet at the same time Purchas's concern with new knowledge of ships, maps, compasses, geography, as well as customs and superstitions, frequently suggests the early beginnings of something approaching modern nonreligious secularity.Less
In this early‐seventeenth‐century collection of travel writings we can see tensions between Religion as Christian Truth on the one hand, and the beginnings of a generic concept of religions matched by an ambiguously modern secular ethnographic style on the other. This work of “pilgrimage” reflects the competition for trade and the processes of colonization, alongside the development of new ways of classifying the world and its contents. Purchas frames his whole work in Biblical terms, drawing explicitly on the expulsion of Adam and Eve, the Flood, and the Tower of Babel as explanatory concepts for the bewildering variety of newly discovered forms of human life. Yet an ironic and quite frequent application of “religions” to “superstitions” at times suggests an early if ambiguous generic modern usage, as if he is adopting a secular high ground. The world is most certainly “profane” in the sense of “fallen”; yet at the same time Purchas's concern with new knowledge of ships, maps, compasses, geography, as well as customs and superstitions, frequently suggests the early beginnings of something approaching modern nonreligious secularity.
Nicholas Canny
- Published in print:
- 2001
- Published Online:
- January 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780198200918
- eISBN:
- 9780191718274
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198200918.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, British and Irish Early Modern History
This book is the first comprehensive study of all the plantations that were attempted in Ireland during the years 1580-1650. It examines the arguments advanced by successive political figures for a ...
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This book is the first comprehensive study of all the plantations that were attempted in Ireland during the years 1580-1650. It examines the arguments advanced by successive political figures for a plantation policy, and the responses which this policy elicited from different segments of the population in Ireland. The book opens with an analysis of the complete works of Edmund Spenser who was the most articulate ideologue for plantation. The author argues that all subsequent advocates of plantation, ranging from King James VI and I, to Strafford, to Oliver Cromwell, were guided by Spenser's opinions, and that discrepancies between plantation in theory and practice were measured against this yardstick. The book culminates with a close analysis of the 1641 insurrection throughout Ireland, which, it is argued, steeled Cromwell to engage in one last effort to make Ireland British.Less
This book is the first comprehensive study of all the plantations that were attempted in Ireland during the years 1580-1650. It examines the arguments advanced by successive political figures for a plantation policy, and the responses which this policy elicited from different segments of the population in Ireland. The book opens with an analysis of the complete works of Edmund Spenser who was the most articulate ideologue for plantation. The author argues that all subsequent advocates of plantation, ranging from King James VI and I, to Strafford, to Oliver Cromwell, were guided by Spenser's opinions, and that discrepancies between plantation in theory and practice were measured against this yardstick. The book culminates with a close analysis of the 1641 insurrection throughout Ireland, which, it is argued, steeled Cromwell to engage in one last effort to make Ireland British.
NICHOLAS CANNY
- Published in print:
- 2001
- Published Online:
- January 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780198200918
- eISBN:
- 9780191718274
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198200918.003.0003
- Subject:
- History, British and Irish Early Modern History
This chapter discusses the establishment of the Munster plantation. It shows that the plantation society which had been painfully and expensively established over a process of thirteen years was ...
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This chapter discusses the establishment of the Munster plantation. It shows that the plantation society which had been painfully and expensively established over a process of thirteen years was swept from the ground. Yet the fact that a plantation society had been brought into being and that its opponents had ultimately been defeated meant that the government was honour-bound to ensure that the undertakers were recalled to their duty and compelled to re-establish the plantation on more secure foundations. However, as officials issued these directives, they were convinced that the initial scheme was defective principally because it had relied excessively on the educational efficacy of model settlements which would be erected within an Irish environment. Therefore, it came to be assumed that such settlements could never endure if left in isolation, and Spenser's idea — that the entire country would have to be subjected to a scheme of plantation which would be promoted by the army — was adopted as a matter of principle by those who upheld the crown's interests in the country, even if this idea was not endorsed as official government policy. Therefore, this first experience at plantation in Munster was to have a lasting influence on the formulation of English policy for Ireland until well into the 17th century.Less
This chapter discusses the establishment of the Munster plantation. It shows that the plantation society which had been painfully and expensively established over a process of thirteen years was swept from the ground. Yet the fact that a plantation society had been brought into being and that its opponents had ultimately been defeated meant that the government was honour-bound to ensure that the undertakers were recalled to their duty and compelled to re-establish the plantation on more secure foundations. However, as officials issued these directives, they were convinced that the initial scheme was defective principally because it had relied excessively on the educational efficacy of model settlements which would be erected within an Irish environment. Therefore, it came to be assumed that such settlements could never endure if left in isolation, and Spenser's idea — that the entire country would have to be subjected to a scheme of plantation which would be promoted by the army — was adopted as a matter of principle by those who upheld the crown's interests in the country, even if this idea was not endorsed as official government policy. Therefore, this first experience at plantation in Munster was to have a lasting influence on the formulation of English policy for Ireland until well into the 17th century.
Paul Giles
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- October 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780691136134
- eISBN:
- 9781400836512
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Princeton University Press
- DOI:
- 10.23943/princeton/9780691136134.003.0002
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
This chapter examines the Augustan tradition in American literature, arguing that it should not be seen as confined to the world of belles lettres. It suggests that Augustan American literature ...
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This chapter examines the Augustan tradition in American literature, arguing that it should not be seen as confined to the world of belles lettres. It suggests that Augustan American literature involves the creative entanglement of potentially contradictory narratives, and the peculiar power of its art derives from its sense of being deliberately out of place, of transgressing the boundaries of civil convention in the interests of exploration and extravagance. The chapter explores the relationship between plantations and the aesthetics of extravagance by offering a critique of Cotton Mather's Magnalia Christi Americana, which describes an increasing sense toward the end of the seventeenth century of the importance of geography, of the position of New England in relation to the rest of the world. It also analyzes the poetry of Phillis Wheatley, Timothy Dwight, and Richard Alsop.Less
This chapter examines the Augustan tradition in American literature, arguing that it should not be seen as confined to the world of belles lettres. It suggests that Augustan American literature involves the creative entanglement of potentially contradictory narratives, and the peculiar power of its art derives from its sense of being deliberately out of place, of transgressing the boundaries of civil convention in the interests of exploration and extravagance. The chapter explores the relationship between plantations and the aesthetics of extravagance by offering a critique of Cotton Mather's Magnalia Christi Americana, which describes an increasing sense toward the end of the seventeenth century of the importance of geography, of the position of New England in relation to the rest of the world. It also analyzes the poetry of Phillis Wheatley, Timothy Dwight, and Richard Alsop.
Sarah Washbrook
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- January 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780197264973
- eISBN:
- 9780191754128
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- British Academy
- DOI:
- 10.5871/bacad/9780197264973.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, Latin American History
Race, ethnicity, and gender played an important role in the complex relationship between export agriculture, labour, and state power in Chiapas during the regime of Porfirio Díaz (1876–1914). This ...
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Race, ethnicity, and gender played an important role in the complex relationship between export agriculture, labour, and state power in Chiapas during the regime of Porfirio Díaz (1876–1914). This case study of tropical plantation development and major regional study of modern Mexico analyzes the politics of state-building and the history of land tenure and rural labour in the state of Chiapas in the period leading up to the outbreak of Revolution in 1910. The book also contributes to the growing history of indigenous peoples in Latin America, examining the changing relationship between Indian groups and non-Indian governments and economic interests in Chiapas during the nineteenth century. In so doing, it addresses questions of tradition, modernity, national state-building, globalization, and the development of capitalism in Latin America. The book argues that colonial caste identities and relations were no impediments to modernization. Instead, they were modified by liberalism, reinterpreted through the lenses of positivism and scientific racism, and managed through an increasingly centralized state apparatus. Indian communities emerge, then, not solely as oppressed and marginalized, but as an integral part of increasingly centralized state power and as institutions through which growing demands for labour and taxes could be made. Debt peonage, too, was upheld by the liberal state, sanctioned by the law as a natural everyday relationship, and buttressed by traditional patriarchy and gender relationships. Thus, in Chiapas the Porfirian regime recycled and redeployed pre-existing social and political relations, reinventing tradition to serve the purposes of modernization and progress.Less
Race, ethnicity, and gender played an important role in the complex relationship between export agriculture, labour, and state power in Chiapas during the regime of Porfirio Díaz (1876–1914). This case study of tropical plantation development and major regional study of modern Mexico analyzes the politics of state-building and the history of land tenure and rural labour in the state of Chiapas in the period leading up to the outbreak of Revolution in 1910. The book also contributes to the growing history of indigenous peoples in Latin America, examining the changing relationship between Indian groups and non-Indian governments and economic interests in Chiapas during the nineteenth century. In so doing, it addresses questions of tradition, modernity, national state-building, globalization, and the development of capitalism in Latin America. The book argues that colonial caste identities and relations were no impediments to modernization. Instead, they were modified by liberalism, reinterpreted through the lenses of positivism and scientific racism, and managed through an increasingly centralized state apparatus. Indian communities emerge, then, not solely as oppressed and marginalized, but as an integral part of increasingly centralized state power and as institutions through which growing demands for labour and taxes could be made. Debt peonage, too, was upheld by the liberal state, sanctioned by the law as a natural everyday relationship, and buttressed by traditional patriarchy and gender relationships. Thus, in Chiapas the Porfirian regime recycled and redeployed pre-existing social and political relations, reinventing tradition to serve the purposes of modernization and progress.
Betty Booth Donohue
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- May 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780813037370
- eISBN:
- 9780813042336
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University Press of Florida
- DOI:
- 10.5744/florida/9780813037370.003.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
This preface states the book's thesis that American Indians influenced American literature, and delineates the author's methodologies employed to support this claim. To illustrate Of Plimoth ...
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This preface states the book's thesis that American Indians influenced American literature, and delineates the author's methodologies employed to support this claim. To illustrate Of Plimoth Plantation's Native influence, the author reads the history from a Native point of view; analyzes the impact of Indianization upon the colonists; and uses close reading and theories of narratology to shed light upon Bradford's text. She also compares Bradford's text to extant works in the American Indian oral tradition, such as Navajo healing chants and Black Elk's vision recitation. The author evaluates Native–colonial social contact, explains pan-tribal metaphysics and intellectual systems operating in the seventeenth-century New World, and utilizes Native interpretative techniques in reaching her conclusions. In addition to Of Plimoth Plantation, she also discusses Mourt's Relation and Edward Winslow's Good Newes from New England.Less
This preface states the book's thesis that American Indians influenced American literature, and delineates the author's methodologies employed to support this claim. To illustrate Of Plimoth Plantation's Native influence, the author reads the history from a Native point of view; analyzes the impact of Indianization upon the colonists; and uses close reading and theories of narratology to shed light upon Bradford's text. She also compares Bradford's text to extant works in the American Indian oral tradition, such as Navajo healing chants and Black Elk's vision recitation. The author evaluates Native–colonial social contact, explains pan-tribal metaphysics and intellectual systems operating in the seventeenth-century New World, and utilizes Native interpretative techniques in reaching her conclusions. In addition to Of Plimoth Plantation, she also discusses Mourt's Relation and Edward Winslow's Good Newes from New England.
Barbara Goff and Michael Simpson
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- January 2008
- ISBN:
- 9780199217182
- eISBN:
- 9780191712388
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199217182.003.0004
- Subject:
- Classical Studies, Literary Studies: Classical, Early, and Medieval
Rita Dove's The Darker Face of the Earth examines the process of building ‘America’ out of partly African materials. Incest becomes a sign for the forced amalgamation of cultures that characterized ...
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Rita Dove's The Darker Face of the Earth examines the process of building ‘America’ out of partly African materials. Incest becomes a sign for the forced amalgamation of cultures that characterized plantation slavery, and the oedipal tropes of knowledge, parentage, desire, and narrative are made newly relevant by the particular racialized history of the United States. The politics of the Greek drama, whereby the hero is pitted against the community, are also interrogated by the various choices made by figures such as Augustus, the chorus and the conspirators. The issue of oedipally competing traditions is scrutinised via African-American tropes such as Esu, the talking book, and the tragic mulatto/a. Also examined is the cultural position of the dramatist herself, as a black woman writer and a member of the generation immediately after the Black Arts Movement.Less
Rita Dove's The Darker Face of the Earth examines the process of building ‘America’ out of partly African materials. Incest becomes a sign for the forced amalgamation of cultures that characterized plantation slavery, and the oedipal tropes of knowledge, parentage, desire, and narrative are made newly relevant by the particular racialized history of the United States. The politics of the Greek drama, whereby the hero is pitted against the community, are also interrogated by the various choices made by figures such as Augustus, the chorus and the conspirators. The issue of oedipally competing traditions is scrutinised via African-American tropes such as Esu, the talking book, and the tragic mulatto/a. Also examined is the cultural position of the dramatist herself, as a black woman writer and a member of the generation immediately after the Black Arts Movement.
Martin Ruef
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- October 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780691162775
- eISBN:
- 9781400852642
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Princeton University Press
- DOI:
- 10.23943/princeton/9780691162775.003.0002
- Subject:
- Sociology, Politics, Social Movements and Social Change
This chapter studies the extent to which the Freedmen Bureau's effort to reinstate plantation labor for former slaves in the mid-1860s was associated with changes in the valuation of black labor. ...
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This chapter studies the extent to which the Freedmen Bureau's effort to reinstate plantation labor for former slaves in the mid-1860s was associated with changes in the valuation of black labor. Despite similarities in coercion and the organization of labor, the valuation of wage labor under the bureau was linked to human capital investments and statistical discrimination in ways that were fundamentally different from the valuations observed in appraisals, purchases, and hires within the antebellum slave market. This shift in the logic of valuation produced uncertainty among bureau agents, employers, and former bondsmen and women themselves as to how black workers would be compensated within the emerging free labor market of the American South.Less
This chapter studies the extent to which the Freedmen Bureau's effort to reinstate plantation labor for former slaves in the mid-1860s was associated with changes in the valuation of black labor. Despite similarities in coercion and the organization of labor, the valuation of wage labor under the bureau was linked to human capital investments and statistical discrimination in ways that were fundamentally different from the valuations observed in appraisals, purchases, and hires within the antebellum slave market. This shift in the logic of valuation produced uncertainty among bureau agents, employers, and former bondsmen and women themselves as to how black workers would be compensated within the emerging free labor market of the American South.
Deepak Lal and H. Myint
- Published in print:
- 1998
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780198294320
- eISBN:
- 9780191596582
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0198294328.003.0005
- Subject:
- Economics and Finance, Development, Growth, and Environmental
This chapter attempts to provide a framework for interpreting the longer‐run aspects of the different economic outcomes identified in the comparative developing country studies addressed in the book. ...
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This chapter attempts to provide a framework for interpreting the longer‐run aspects of the different economic outcomes identified in the comparative developing country studies addressed in the book. These are that in some countries economic growth through export expansion has been accompanied by a tendency towards more equal distribution of incomes, while in others income distribution has tended to become more unequal. Organizational and institutional factors are introduced into the conventional framework of international trade, in the hope of obtaining a better understanding of the relationship between exports and economic growth and the role of different types of economic policy. The country studies are then reinterpreted in these terms: small economies, peasant export economies, plantation and mining economies, and mixed cases are addressed separately.Less
This chapter attempts to provide a framework for interpreting the longer‐run aspects of the different economic outcomes identified in the comparative developing country studies addressed in the book. These are that in some countries economic growth through export expansion has been accompanied by a tendency towards more equal distribution of incomes, while in others income distribution has tended to become more unequal. Organizational and institutional factors are introduced into the conventional framework of international trade, in the hope of obtaining a better understanding of the relationship between exports and economic growth and the role of different types of economic policy. The country studies are then reinterpreted in these terms: small economies, peasant export economies, plantation and mining economies, and mixed cases are addressed separately.
Sarah Washbrook
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- January 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780197264973
- eISBN:
- 9780191754128
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- British Academy
- DOI:
- 10.5871/bacad/9780197264973.003.0009
- Subject:
- History, Latin American History
This chapter examines the relationship between debt peonage and regional export development between 1876 and 1914 in four departments of Chiapas: Pichucalco, Chilón, and Palenque in the north of the ...
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This chapter examines the relationship between debt peonage and regional export development between 1876 and 1914 in four departments of Chiapas: Pichucalco, Chilón, and Palenque in the north of the state and Soconusco on the Pacific coast. All of these departments underwent considerable commercial development during the Porfiriato based on the production of tropical agricultural commodities such as coffee, cacao, rubber, and hard woods, and Soconusco, Palenque, and Chilón were recipients of significant foreign capital. However, the impact of market development on labour relations was not uniform: whereas in Soconusco plantation agriculture tended to undermine labour coercion, in the other departments these years saw the intensification and spread of servile peonage. The chapter shows that such changes were principally the product of regional market conditions and the capacity of the state to intervene in the process of labour contracting.Less
This chapter examines the relationship between debt peonage and regional export development between 1876 and 1914 in four departments of Chiapas: Pichucalco, Chilón, and Palenque in the north of the state and Soconusco on the Pacific coast. All of these departments underwent considerable commercial development during the Porfiriato based on the production of tropical agricultural commodities such as coffee, cacao, rubber, and hard woods, and Soconusco, Palenque, and Chilón were recipients of significant foreign capital. However, the impact of market development on labour relations was not uniform: whereas in Soconusco plantation agriculture tended to undermine labour coercion, in the other departments these years saw the intensification and spread of servile peonage. The chapter shows that such changes were principally the product of regional market conditions and the capacity of the state to intervene in the process of labour contracting.
Paul Younger
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- February 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780195391640
- eISBN:
- 9780199866649
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195391640.003.0002
- Subject:
- Religion, Hinduism
The plantation owners of Mauritius were French settlers who had established an aristocratic style for themselves during the eighteenth century using slaves from Africa. The Indian workers quickly ...
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The plantation owners of Mauritius were French settlers who had established an aristocratic style for themselves during the eighteenth century using slaves from Africa. The Indian workers quickly came to constitute three‐quarters of the total population, but they respected the cultural norms the French had already established. Many were soon plantation owners themselves, and they created a parallel Indian aristocracy. There are fine stone temples for the goddesses Mīnākṣi, Draupadī, and Māriyamman in the South Indian style, and a beautiful North Indian‐style temple in Triolet. In the early twentieth century, the Arya Samaj became active and built a plainer style of temple. After the introduction of democratic government in 1968, the Indian political leadership was careful not to change the French‐led cultural pattern too drastically. The one notable change is the new public celebration of Śivarātri.Less
The plantation owners of Mauritius were French settlers who had established an aristocratic style for themselves during the eighteenth century using slaves from Africa. The Indian workers quickly came to constitute three‐quarters of the total population, but they respected the cultural norms the French had already established. Many were soon plantation owners themselves, and they created a parallel Indian aristocracy. There are fine stone temples for the goddesses Mīnākṣi, Draupadī, and Māriyamman in the South Indian style, and a beautiful North Indian‐style temple in Triolet. In the early twentieth century, the Arya Samaj became active and built a plainer style of temple. After the introduction of democratic government in 1968, the Indian political leadership was careful not to change the French‐led cultural pattern too drastically. The one notable change is the new public celebration of Śivarātri.
Paul Younger
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- February 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780195391640
- eISBN:
- 9780199866649
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195391640.003.0003
- Subject:
- Religion, Hinduism
In Guyana, the plantation owners were largely absentee capitalists, and the former slaves, who had no other livelihood available, simply moved into settlements beside the plantations and continued to ...
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In Guyana, the plantation owners were largely absentee capitalists, and the former slaves, who had no other livelihood available, simply moved into settlements beside the plantations and continued to work on the plantations with the newly arrived Indians. When the Indians later also moved into the settlements, their small mandir temples were close copies of the nearby Afro‐Guyanese churches. Because some Brāhmans among the North Indian workers could recite the Rāmcharitmānas, they became the pandits or preachers of the North Indian tradition, while pūjaris who could go into trance became the leaders of a South Indian tradition centered on the goddess Māriyamman. In the confined social atmosphere, these two invented traditions became the exclusive forms of Hindu worship. Political independence saw the development of some rivalry between the previously well‐integrated Afro‐Guyanese and Indo‐Guyanese communities.Less
In Guyana, the plantation owners were largely absentee capitalists, and the former slaves, who had no other livelihood available, simply moved into settlements beside the plantations and continued to work on the plantations with the newly arrived Indians. When the Indians later also moved into the settlements, their small mandir temples were close copies of the nearby Afro‐Guyanese churches. Because some Brāhmans among the North Indian workers could recite the Rāmcharitmānas, they became the pandits or preachers of the North Indian tradition, while pūjaris who could go into trance became the leaders of a South Indian tradition centered on the goddess Māriyamman. In the confined social atmosphere, these two invented traditions became the exclusive forms of Hindu worship. Political independence saw the development of some rivalry between the previously well‐integrated Afro‐Guyanese and Indo‐Guyanese communities.
Lian Pin Koh and Toby A. Gardner
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- February 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199554232
- eISBN:
- 9780191720666
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199554232.003.0014
- Subject:
- Biology, Ecology, Biodiversity / Conservation Biology
Lian Pin Koh and Toby A. Gardner discuss the challenges of conserving biodiversity in degraded and modified landscapes with a focus on the tropical terrestrial biome in this chapter. Given that ...
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Lian Pin Koh and Toby A. Gardner discuss the challenges of conserving biodiversity in degraded and modified landscapes with a focus on the tropical terrestrial biome in this chapter. Given that approximately one quarter of the world's threatened species live outside protected areas, and that the integrity of protected areas where they exist is often threatened, we need to integrate conservation efforts with other human activities. Partially modified landscapes are an important and valuable asset for biodiversity conservation and should not be overlooked by biologists and conservationists. Recent studies demonstrate there are important opportunities for conserving biodiversity within the dominant types of human land‐use, including logged forests, agroforestry systems, monoculture plantations, agricultural lands, urban areas, and regenerating land. It is the local people that ultimately decide the fate of their local environments, even if the decisions they make fall within a wider political, social, and economic context. Key to achieving success and developing sustainable management strategies is the ability to build participatory and multidisciplinary approaches to research and management that involve not only conservation biologists, but also agroecologists, agronomists, farmers, indigenous peoples, rural social movements, foresters, social scientists, and land managers.Less
Lian Pin Koh and Toby A. Gardner discuss the challenges of conserving biodiversity in degraded and modified landscapes with a focus on the tropical terrestrial biome in this chapter. Given that approximately one quarter of the world's threatened species live outside protected areas, and that the integrity of protected areas where they exist is often threatened, we need to integrate conservation efforts with other human activities. Partially modified landscapes are an important and valuable asset for biodiversity conservation and should not be overlooked by biologists and conservationists. Recent studies demonstrate there are important opportunities for conserving biodiversity within the dominant types of human land‐use, including logged forests, agroforestry systems, monoculture plantations, agricultural lands, urban areas, and regenerating land. It is the local people that ultimately decide the fate of their local environments, even if the decisions they make fall within a wider political, social, and economic context. Key to achieving success and developing sustainable management strategies is the ability to build participatory and multidisciplinary approaches to research and management that involve not only conservation biologists, but also agroecologists, agronomists, farmers, indigenous peoples, rural social movements, foresters, social scientists, and land managers.
William F. Laurance
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- February 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199554232
- eISBN:
- 9780191720666
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199554232.003.0005
- Subject:
- Biology, Ecology, Biodiversity / Conservation Biology
William F. Laurance provides an overview of contemporary habitat loss in this chapter. Vast amounts of habitat destruction have already occurred. for instance, about half of all global forest cover ...
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William F. Laurance provides an overview of contemporary habitat loss in this chapter. Vast amounts of habitat destruction have already occurred. for instance, about half of all global forest cover has been lost, and forests have virtually vanished in over 50 nations worldwide. Habitat destruction has been highly uneven among different ecosystems. From a geographic perspective, islands, coastal areas, wetlands, regions with large or growing human populations, and emerging agricultural frontiers are all sustaining rapid habitat loss. From a biome perspective, habitat loss has been very high in Mediterranean forests, temperate forest‐steppe and woodland, temperate broadleaf forests, and tropical coniferous forests. Other ecosystems, particularly tropical rainforests, are now disappearing rapidly. Habitat destruction in the temperate zone peaked in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Although considerable habitat loss is occurring in some temperate ecosystems, overall forest cover is now increasing from forest regeneration and plantation establishment in some temperate regions. Primary (old‐growth) habitats are rapidly diminishing across much of the earth. In their place, a variety of semi‐natural or intensively managed ecosystems are being established. For example, although just two‐tenths of the temperate coniferous forests have disappeared, vast areas are being converted from old‐growth to timber‐production forests, with a greatly simplified stand structure and species composition. Boreal ecosystems have suffered relatively limited reductions to date but are especially vulnerable to global warming. Boreal forests could become increasingly vulnerable to destructive fires if future conditions become warmer or drier.Less
William F. Laurance provides an overview of contemporary habitat loss in this chapter. Vast amounts of habitat destruction have already occurred. for instance, about half of all global forest cover has been lost, and forests have virtually vanished in over 50 nations worldwide. Habitat destruction has been highly uneven among different ecosystems. From a geographic perspective, islands, coastal areas, wetlands, regions with large or growing human populations, and emerging agricultural frontiers are all sustaining rapid habitat loss. From a biome perspective, habitat loss has been very high in Mediterranean forests, temperate forest‐steppe and woodland, temperate broadleaf forests, and tropical coniferous forests. Other ecosystems, particularly tropical rainforests, are now disappearing rapidly. Habitat destruction in the temperate zone peaked in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Although considerable habitat loss is occurring in some temperate ecosystems, overall forest cover is now increasing from forest regeneration and plantation establishment in some temperate regions. Primary (old‐growth) habitats are rapidly diminishing across much of the earth. In their place, a variety of semi‐natural or intensively managed ecosystems are being established. For example, although just two‐tenths of the temperate coniferous forests have disappeared, vast areas are being converted from old‐growth to timber‐production forests, with a greatly simplified stand structure and species composition. Boreal ecosystems have suffered relatively limited reductions to date but are especially vulnerable to global warming. Boreal forests could become increasingly vulnerable to destructive fires if future conditions become warmer or drier.
Robert Wyatt and John Andrew Johnson
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780195327113
- eISBN:
- 9780199851249
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195327113.003.0025
- Subject:
- Music, Popular
This chapter presents the text of George Gershwin's essay titled Jazz is the Voice of the American Soul, which was published in the June 1926 issue of Theatre Magazine. Gershwin considered jazz as ...
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This chapter presents the text of George Gershwin's essay titled Jazz is the Voice of the American Soul, which was published in the June 1926 issue of Theatre Magazine. Gershwin considered jazz as the voice of the American soul because it is the plantation song that was improved and transformed into finer, bigger harmonies. To him, jazz is a combination that includes the wail, the whine, and the exultant note of the old “mammy” of the South. Gershwin also provided his thoughts on comments that the peak of his career was the performance of his Concerto in F in Carnegie Hall with the New York Symphony Orchestra.Less
This chapter presents the text of George Gershwin's essay titled Jazz is the Voice of the American Soul, which was published in the June 1926 issue of Theatre Magazine. Gershwin considered jazz as the voice of the American soul because it is the plantation song that was improved and transformed into finer, bigger harmonies. To him, jazz is a combination that includes the wail, the whine, and the exultant note of the old “mammy” of the South. Gershwin also provided his thoughts on comments that the peak of his career was the performance of his Concerto in F in Carnegie Hall with the New York Symphony Orchestra.
Sean M. Kelley
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- September 2016
- ISBN:
- 9781469627687
- eISBN:
- 9781469627700
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of North Carolina Press
- DOI:
- 10.5149/northcarolina/9781469627687.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, African-American History
From late 1754 to early 1755, the slave ship Hare completed a journey from Newport, Rhode Island, to Sierra Leone, and back to the United States—a journey which transformed over seventy Africans into ...
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From late 1754 to early 1755, the slave ship Hare completed a journey from Newport, Rhode Island, to Sierra Leone, and back to the United States—a journey which transformed over seventy Africans into commodities, condemning several of them to death and the rest to a life of bondage in North America. In this detailed narrative, the book reconstructs this tumultuous voyage, covering everything from the significance of slave trading to the New England economy and the identities of the captain and crew, to their encounters with inclement weather, slave dealers, and near mutiny. But most important, the book tracks the cohort of slaves aboard the Hare from their purchase in Africa to the rice and indigo plantations of colonial South Carolina. In tracing their complete journey, the book provides rare and detailed insight into the communal lives of slaves, and sheds new light on the African diaspora and its influence on the formation of African-American culture. The Hare captives’ story underscores the extent to which the African Diaspora was a highly structured, rather than culturally “randomizing” process, resulting in communities of Africans of common linguistic and cultural background living in close proximity to one another in the New World. Rather than living in isolation, the Hare captives were part of a large community of people of Mande background that left an indelible cultural stamp on the eighteenth-century Carolina Low Country.Less
From late 1754 to early 1755, the slave ship Hare completed a journey from Newport, Rhode Island, to Sierra Leone, and back to the United States—a journey which transformed over seventy Africans into commodities, condemning several of them to death and the rest to a life of bondage in North America. In this detailed narrative, the book reconstructs this tumultuous voyage, covering everything from the significance of slave trading to the New England economy and the identities of the captain and crew, to their encounters with inclement weather, slave dealers, and near mutiny. But most important, the book tracks the cohort of slaves aboard the Hare from their purchase in Africa to the rice and indigo plantations of colonial South Carolina. In tracing their complete journey, the book provides rare and detailed insight into the communal lives of slaves, and sheds new light on the African diaspora and its influence on the formation of African-American culture. The Hare captives’ story underscores the extent to which the African Diaspora was a highly structured, rather than culturally “randomizing” process, resulting in communities of Africans of common linguistic and cultural background living in close proximity to one another in the New World. Rather than living in isolation, the Hare captives were part of a large community of people of Mande background that left an indelible cultural stamp on the eighteenth-century Carolina Low Country.
Alison Games
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- September 2008
- ISBN:
- 9780195335545
- eISBN:
- 9780199869039
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195335545.003.0005
- Subject:
- History, British and Irish Early Modern History
This chapter explores the Virginia settlement, which set a new style of English overseas venture — the plantation colony — in the context of the trading world that produced it. Because of the ...
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This chapter explores the Virginia settlement, which set a new style of English overseas venture — the plantation colony — in the context of the trading world that produced it. Because of the heightened interest some English investors showed in colonies in the wake of Virginia's successful establishment, by the 1610s and 1620s a new population of experienced colonial governors emerged, men who ventured from one post to another.Less
This chapter explores the Virginia settlement, which set a new style of English overseas venture — the plantation colony — in the context of the trading world that produced it. Because of the heightened interest some English investors showed in colonies in the wake of Virginia's successful establishment, by the 1610s and 1620s a new population of experienced colonial governors emerged, men who ventured from one post to another.
S. J. Connolly
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- January 2008
- ISBN:
- 9780198208167
- eISBN:
- 9780191716546
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198208167.003.0006
- Subject:
- History, British and Irish Early Modern History
The defeat of the rebellion of the earl of Desmond opened the way for the first large scale experiment in colonization — the plantation of Munster. Government policy met with less opposition in the ...
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The defeat of the rebellion of the earl of Desmond opened the way for the first large scale experiment in colonization — the plantation of Munster. Government policy met with less opposition in the west, where the composition of Connacht won the support of major landowners, although the local administration also used extreme violence to impose its authority. There was less open resistance than in England to the return to Protestantism under Elizabeth I. However, committed Irish-born Protestants remained a small minority. The descendants of the medieval colonists continued to emphasize their English culture and allegiance. But their anomalous position as Catholic subjects of a Protestant queen, along with disputes over taxation and competition from more recent settlers, led to the emergence of a new defensive sense of identity, reflected in the appearance of the term ‘Old English’.Less
The defeat of the rebellion of the earl of Desmond opened the way for the first large scale experiment in colonization — the plantation of Munster. Government policy met with less opposition in the west, where the composition of Connacht won the support of major landowners, although the local administration also used extreme violence to impose its authority. There was less open resistance than in England to the return to Protestantism under Elizabeth I. However, committed Irish-born Protestants remained a small minority. The descendants of the medieval colonists continued to emphasize their English culture and allegiance. But their anomalous position as Catholic subjects of a Protestant queen, along with disputes over taxation and competition from more recent settlers, led to the emergence of a new defensive sense of identity, reflected in the appearance of the term ‘Old English’.
