Thomas N. Ingersoll
A thoughtful, comprehensive, wide-ranging treatment of the subject of race in New Orleans in the colonial and early national period. It is rare to see a book as thoroughly documented as this one, and as rich in colorful and appropriately chosen examples to illustrate larger points of argument.
— Thomas N. Ingersoll, The Ohio State University
Gwendolyn Midlo Hall
A timely, path-breaking, and totally convincing refutation of the prevailing ideologically driven view that all southern whites were always hopeless racists and all women of color were always helpless victims. It helps lay the basis for our new understanding of the diversity of the culture of the USA.
— Gwendolyn Midlo Hall, author of Africans in Colonial Louisiana: the Development of Afro-Creole Culture in the Eighteenth Century
From the Publisher
A thoughtful, comprehensive, wide-ranging treatment of the subject of race in New Orleans in the colonial and early national period. It is rare to see a book as thoroughly documented as this one, and as rich in colorful and appropriately chosen examples to illustrate larger points of argument.—Thomas N. Ingersoll, The Ohio State University
A timely, path-breaking, and totally convincing refutation of the prevailing ideologically driven view that all southern whites were always hopeless racists and all women of color were always helpless victims. It helps lay the basis for our new understanding of the diversity of the culture of the USA.—Gwendolyn Midlo Hall, author of Africans in Colonial Louisiana: the Development of Afro-Creole Culture in the Eighteenth Century
By focusing on everyday practice as well as on law and policy, Jennifer Spear vividly explains how free people of color became a significant social group in colonial New Orleans. She takes full advantage of tangibly special circumstances—regional economic conditions, governance by multiple regimes, and rich archival records—to replace stale assumptions about the Crescent City’s peculiar society with fresh insights into its comparative importance in early American history.—Daniel Usner, Vanderbilt University
Daniel Usner
By focusing on everyday practice as well as on law and policy, Jennifer Spear vividly explains how free people of color became a significant social group in colonial New Orleans. She takes full advantage of tangibly special circumstances—regional economic conditions, governance by multiple regimes, and rich archival records—to replace stale assumptions about the Crescent City’s peculiar society with fresh insights into its comparative importance in early American history.
— Daniel Usner, Vanderbilt University
