Críticas:
The issue of slavery in American history has never been as clear-cut as some would prefer, and no one has done more to explain its ironies, contradictions and complexities than David Brion Davis. In this slender, beautifully written book, he explores the origin and eradication of the peculiar institution based on boundaries imposed by men and events, in the process giving us yet another classic. Dallas Morning News 20040118 In Challenging the Boundaries of Slavery [Davis provides] brief but incisive reflections on slavery in American and world history. -- George M. Fredrickson New York Review of Books 20040308 A brief, but illuminating, account of the ways in which slavery crossed a kind of psychological barrier to place black slaves outside the dreams of liberty and equality, is David Brion Davis' Challenging the Boundaries of Slavery. After a wideranging introduction, the author focuses on the year 1819 and the beginnings of abolitionism. History Today 20040501 A brief, but illuminating, account of the ways in which slavery crossed a kind of psychological barrier to place black slaves outside the dreams of liberty and equality. History Today 20040501 Challenging the Boundaries of Slavery is an insightful and engaging piece of work. It intertwines macro and micro histories concerning the origins and abolition of the Atlantic slave system and presents a sophisticated and complex historical synthesis that broadens the current debate and suggests new ways of thinking about the factors shaping the course of slavery in American history...This book emphasizes the fact that questions regarding slavery were intimately connected to wider debates and discourses in antebellum America concerning issues such as national character, economics and expansion. In incredibly lucid and articulate terms Davis weaves these strands together and impresses upon us the significance of slavery to the American past. -- Rebecca J. Griffin Journal of American Studies 20050601 The three chapters of this short book offer smart apercus, insightful nuggets from the master historian of comparative slavery...Davis proves here that his mind is as subtle and vigorous as ever. This reader eagerly awaits more works from the greatest living historian of comparative slavery. -- Philip D. Morgan American Historical Review 20050601 Few scholars equal Davis's breadth and depth of knowledge mastered during his long career. Indeed, few would fault Davis if he merely took the opportunity to retrace old ground in his lectures, but it is a hallmark of this distinguished historian that he continues to recast his material, engage new sources, and think out loud in productive fashion about the meaning of slavery in the western world...By marking his retelling of the abolition of slavery with new signposts, by casting new actors in leading roles, and by proposing the existence of a much more elaborate historical context, Davis once again prompts his readers to think anew about not only the history of slavery but also the history of the United States. -- Michael J. Guasco Journal of Southern History 20050501 Perhaps the world's foremost authority on slavery...has made yet another contribution to our understanding of an ancient institution that was once ubiquitous but is now considered peculiar. With his usual clarity and concision, Davis summarizes the history of slavery from its prehistoric origins to its abolition in the United States in 1865...Davis's small volume is filled with fascinating facts...[This] masterful work... is an ideal introduction to the history of slavery for general readers and is illuminating even for scholars. The writing is clear, concise, informative and insightful. -- Carl J. Richard International Journal of the Classic Tradition
Reseña del editor:
In this engaging book, David Brion Davis offers an illuminating perspective on American slavery. Starting with a long view across the temporal and spatial boundaries of world slavery, he traces continuities from the ancient world to the era of exploration, with its expanding markets and rise in consumption of such products as sugar, tobacco, spices, and chocolate, to the conditions of the New World settlement that gave rise to a dependence on the forced labor of millions of African slaves. With the American Revolution, slavery crossed another kind of boundary, in a psychological inversion that placed black slaves outside the dream of liberty and equality--and turned them into the Great American Problem. Davis then delves into a single year, 1819, to explain how an explosive conflict over the expansion and legitimacy of slavery, together with reinterpretations of the Bible and the Constitution, pointed toward revolutionary changes in American culture. Finally, he widens the angle again, in a regional perspective, to discuss the movement to colonize blacks outside the United States, the African-American impact on abolitionism, and the South's response to slave emancipation in the British Caribbean, which led to attempts to morally vindicate slavery and export it into future American states. Challenging the boundaries of slavery ultimately brought on the Civil War and the unexpected, immediate emancipation of slaves long before it could have been achieved in any other way. This imaginative and fascinating book puts slavery into a brilliant new light and underscores anew the desperate human tragedy lying at the very heart of the American story.
"Sobre este título" puede pertenecer a otra edición de este libro.