Stock image for illustration purposes only - book cover, edition or condition may vary.
Race, Sex, and Social Order in Early New Orleans
Jennifer M. Spear
€ 49.91
FREE Delivery in Ireland
Description for Race, Sex, and Social Order in Early New Orleans
Paperback. Strikingly argued, richly researched, and methodologically sound, this wide-ranging look at how choices about sex triumphed over established class systems and artificial racial boundaries supplies a refreshing contribution to the history of early Louisiana. Series: Early America: History, Context, Culture. Num Pages: 352 pages, 7, 7 black & white halftones. BIC Classification: 1KBBSL; 3JF; 3JH; HBJK; HBTB; JFSL1; JHBK5. Category: (P) Professional & Vocational. Dimension: 154 x 229 x 23. Weight in Grams: 494.
A microcosm of exaggerated societal extremes-poverty and wealth, vice and virtue, elitism and equality-New Orleans is a tangled web of race, cultural mores, and sexual identities. Jennifer M. Spear's examination of the dialectical relationship between politics and social practice unravels the city's construction of race during the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Spear brings together archival evidence from three different languages and the most recent and respected scholarship on racial formation and interracial sex to explain why free people of color became a significant population in the early days of New Orleans and to show how authorities attempted to use concepts of race and social hierarchy to impose order on a decidedly disorderly society. She recounts and analyzes the major conflicts that influenced New Orleanian culture: legal attempts to impose racial barriers and social order, political battles over propriety and freedom, and cultural clashes over place and progress. At each turn, Spear's narrative challenges the prevailing academic assumptions and supports her efforts to move exploration of racial formation away from cultural and political discourses and toward social histories. Strikingly argued, richly researched, and methodologically sound, this wide-ranging look at how choices about sex triumphed over established class systems and artificial racial boundaries supplies a refreshing contribution to the history of early Louisiana.
Product Details
Publisher
Johns Hopkins University Press
Format
Paperback
Publication date
2014
Series
Early America: History, Context, Culture
Condition
New
Weight
553g
Number of Pages
352
Place of Publication
Baltimore, MD, United States
ISBN
9781421415734
SKU
V9781421415734
Shipping Time
Usually ships in 7 to 11 working days
Ref
99-1
About Jennifer M. Spear
Jennifer M. Spear is an associate professor of history at Simon Fraser University.
Reviews for Race, Sex, and Social Order in Early New Orleans
Break[s] fresh analytical and methodological ground and respond[s] intelligently to alternative explanatory models pertaining to [its] respective subject. [It is a] significant contribution that will elicit scholarly engagement.
John David Smith
Florida Historical Quarterly
A sophisticated navigation of the intersections of race, status, and sexuality and the permeability of each boundary.
Marilyn Westerkamp
Journal of Southern History
This thoroughly researched, extremely well-documented study gives us a clear understanding of how rulers constantly had to negotiate between what would ensure stability in the colony, what morality commanded, and what their perception of races suggested.
Nathalie Dessens
Journal of American History
An impressive study of the role played by race and sex in creating the familiar racial hierarchy of early New Orleans. Among Spear's many contributions is her detailed uncovering of the competing definitions of race as well as arguments about just what relationships between the various races should look like.
Jeffrey E. Anderson
Journal of American Ethnic History
Spear opens a window into New Orleanians' legal affairs regarding race under different regimes with distinct legal traditions.
Anthony J. Stanonis
Journal of Latin American and Caribbean Anthropology
A wonderful survey of race relations in colonial Louisiana... Bringing things down to an individual level she manages to fuse the micro and macro, creating a layered portrait of colonial society. Her focus on women, their avenues for freedom, and the different responses to their prescribed social role make this interesting for scholars of the regulation of human sexuality, not just race history.
Katrina Gulliver
Itinerario
John David Smith
Florida Historical Quarterly
A sophisticated navigation of the intersections of race, status, and sexuality and the permeability of each boundary.
Marilyn Westerkamp
Journal of Southern History
This thoroughly researched, extremely well-documented study gives us a clear understanding of how rulers constantly had to negotiate between what would ensure stability in the colony, what morality commanded, and what their perception of races suggested.
Nathalie Dessens
Journal of American History
An impressive study of the role played by race and sex in creating the familiar racial hierarchy of early New Orleans. Among Spear's many contributions is her detailed uncovering of the competing definitions of race as well as arguments about just what relationships between the various races should look like.
Jeffrey E. Anderson
Journal of American Ethnic History
Spear opens a window into New Orleanians' legal affairs regarding race under different regimes with distinct legal traditions.
Anthony J. Stanonis
Journal of Latin American and Caribbean Anthropology
A wonderful survey of race relations in colonial Louisiana... Bringing things down to an individual level she manages to fuse the micro and macro, creating a layered portrait of colonial society. Her focus on women, their avenues for freedom, and the different responses to their prescribed social role make this interesting for scholars of the regulation of human sexuality, not just race history.
Katrina Gulliver
Itinerario