Slave Breeding: Sex, Violence, and Memory in African American History By Gregory D. Smithers

Did slave owners breed slaves

A thought provoking piece of scholarship that sheds light on the complex history of slave breeding in America Smithers s book will be hotly debated in the profession Michael L Ondaatje University of Newcastle Australia As engaging as it is compelling bold and captivating Smithers s Slave Breeding pulls the reader through its pages with heart wrenching exposition of the dark and ugly chapter of what could rightly be characterized as the sexual zeitgeist of American national history Tunde Adeleke Iowa State University For over two centuries the topic of slave breeding has occupied a controversial place in the master narrative of American history From nineteenth century abolitionists to twentieth century filmmakers and artists Americans have debated whether slave owners deliberately and coercively manipulated the sexual practices and marital status of enslaved African Americans to reproduce new generations of slaves for profit In this bold and provocative book historian Gregory Smithers investigates how African Americans have narrated remembered and represented slave breeding practices He argues that while social and economic historians have downplayed the significance of slave breeding African Americans have refused to forget the violence and sexual coercion associated with the plantation South By placing African American histories and memories of slave breeding within the larger context of America s history of racial and gender discrimination Smithers sheds much needed light on African American collective memory racialized perceptions of fragile black families and the long history of racially motivated violence against men women and children of color Slave Breeding Sex Violence and Memory in African American HistoryGregory Smithers offers an interpretation of how African Americans and Americans have approached the topic of slave breeding Smithers argues that while white America and many historians have been reluctant to acknowledge its existence and central role in both perpetuating slavery and racism African Americans have both highlighted and minimized its significance The first chapters of Slave Breeding Smithers focuses on the rhetoric around slave breeding through the Reconstruction era the second half calls attention to the various ways the theme has emerged in African American and popular culture An interesting study of popular memory and slavery English A very difficult book to read for those unacquainted with the history of chattel slavery in the American South but a very good one Smithers draws upon the WPA slave narratives in addition to popular memory and the thinly veiled sentiments of slaveowner s publications to reveal a shocking truth about the dehumanization of Black slaves in the antebellum period Although the WPA sources are flawed and there are problems with how the book belabors certain points while dropping others one cannot deny the psychological impact slave breeding had on its descendants Knowing that one was the product of what amounts to sexual assault is a trauma that has been carried down the line whispered memories of grandfathers and grandmothers reduced to their reproductive organs and the shame of loving relationships being ignored by owners who saw them as worth nothing than cattle Smither s work is extremely important in tearing apart myths of benevolent plantations and paternal owners English .