Cultures of Darkness: Night Travels in the Histories of Transgression / Edition 1

by Bryan D. Palmer

Overview

Peasants, religious heretics, witches, pirates, runaway slaves, prostitutes and pornographers, frequenters of taverns and fraternal society lodge rooms, revolutionaries, blues and jazz musicians, beats, and contemporary youth gangs—those who defied authority, choosing to live outside the defining cultural dominions of early insurgent and, later, dominant capitalism are what Bryan D. Palmer calls people of the night. These lives of opposition, or otherness, were seen by the powerful as deviant, rejecting authority, and consequently threatening to the established order.
Constructing a rich historical tapestry of example and experience spanning eight centuries, Palmer details lives of exclusion and challenge, as the "night travels" of the transgressors clash repeatedly with the powerful conventions of their times. Nights of liberation and exhilarating desire—sexual and social—are at the heart of this study. But so too are the dangers of darkness, as marginality is coerced into corners of pressured confinement, or the night is used as a cover for brutalizing terror, as was the case in Nazi Germany or the lynching of African Americans.
Making extensive use of the interdisciplinary literature of marginality found in scholarly work in history, sociology, cultural studies, literature, anthropology, and politics, Palmer takes an unflinching look at the rise and transformation of capitalism as it was lived by the dispossessed and those stamped with the mark of otherness.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781583670279
Publisher:	Monthly Review Press
Publication date:	11/01/2000
Pages:	416
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 1.80(d)

About the Author

BRYAN D. PALMER is Professor of History at Queen's Universityin Kingston Ontario. He is the author of several books including Descent into Discourse: The Reification of Language and the Writing of Social History, Objections and Oppressions: The Histories and Politics of E.P. Thompson, and Goodyear Invades the Backcountry: The Corporate Takeover of a Rural Town.

Editorial Reviews

"The night is different, its opposition to day marked by darkness and danger... [B]ut its fears are balanced by its freedoms," begins this enthralling and important trans-historical study of the metaphoric and actual meaning of night cultures. Palmer's canvas is huge--it ranges from an analysis of early modern witch culture (which he connects to the later development of Puritanism) to the emergence of 19th-century semisecret fraternal orders such as the Oddfellows, the vibrant 20th-century gay male cultures of drag and sadomasochism, and the emergence of a U.S. jazz and blues culture--yet he manages to bring these diverse topics together in a cohesive and astute analysis. Integrating unusual details and artful nuances (from the specifics of 18th-century pirate executions to the links between the Rosenberg trial and the novels of Micky Spillane), Palmer creates a multilayered but seamless portrait of four centuries of Western culture. The underlying theme here is not simply that "night" offers the occasional transgressive respite from the orderly civilization of "day," but that these alternative social, political and artistic spaces are often where the impetus for social change begins. Palmer's bold theme is sustained by his ability to communicate his in-depth, far-ranging scholarship with a broad political vision, which is Marxist in origins but tempered by postmodernism, and by his accessible and highly entertaining writing style. (Feb.) Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

According to Palmer (history, Queens Univ., Canada; Goodyear Invades the Backcountry: The Corporate Takeover of a Rural Town), the controlling social, economic, and political structures since the Middle Ages have created classes of marginalized persons that he calls "people of the night." Palmer uses the image of the night to discuss peasants, witches, prostitutes, bakers, revolutionaries, and jazz musicians, who may not always have worked at night but who existed at the edges of social control. These men and women created exciting cultures containing elements that moved into mainstream society. Palmer also applies the same metaphor to examine repression in Nazi Germany and America's treatment of blacks. While the book is fascinating reading, it is very dense and technically written and assumes a knowledge of the ideas of Karl Marx and Michel Foucault. Nevertheless, it is well worth the effort and nicely complements Stephen J. Pfohl's Images of Deviance and Social Control (McGraw-Hill, 1994). For academic and larger public libraries. Stephen L. Hupp, Urbana Univ., OH Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information.

Library Journal

A teacher of working-class and social history, and editor of the Canadian journal , Palmer chronicles those who defied authority, choosing to live dangerously outside the defining cultural constraints of early insurgent<-->and later dominant<-- >capitalism. They include peasants, religious heretics, witches, pirates, runaway slaves, prostitutes and pornographers, frequenters of taverns and fraternal society lodge rooms, revolutionaries, blues and jazz musicians, beats, and contemporary youth gangs. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

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