The Strange History of the American Quadroon: Free Women of Color in the Revolutionary Atlantic World

by Emily Clark

Overview

Exotic, seductive, and doomed: the antebellum mixed-race free woman of color has long operated as a metaphor for New Orleans. Commonly known as a "quadroon," she and the city she represents rest irretrievably condemned in the popular historical imagination by the linked sins of slavery and interracial sex. However, as Emily Clark shows, the rich archives of New Orleans tell a different story. Free women of color with ancestral roots in New Orleans were as likely to marry in the 1820s as white women. And marriage, not concubinage, was the basis of their family structure. In The Strange History of the American Quadroon, Clark investigates how the narrative of the erotic colored mistress became an elaborate literary and commercial trope, persisting as a symbol that long outlived the political and cultural purposes for which it had been created. Untangling myth and memory, she presents a dramatically new and nuanced understanding of the myths and realities of New Orleans's free women of color.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781469607535
Publisher:	The University of North Carolina Press
Publication date:	04/22/2013
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	296
File size:	4 MB

About the Author

Emily Clark is Clement Chambers Benenson Professor of American Colonial History and associate professor of history at Tulane University. She is author of Masterless Mistresses: The New Orleans Ursulines and the Development of a New World Society, 1727–1834.
Emily Clark is Clement Chambers Benenson Professor of American Colonial History and associate professor of history at Tulane University. She is author of Masterless Mistresses: The New Orleans Ursulines and the Development of a New World Society, 1727-1834.

Table of Contents

Prologue Evolution of a Color Term and an American City's Alienation 1

Chapter 1 The Philadelphia Quadroon 11

Chapter 2 From Ménagère to Placée 38

Chapter 3 Con Otros Muchos: Marriage 71

Chapter 4 Bachelor Patriarchs: Life Partnerships across the Color Line 97

Chapter 5 Making Up the Quadroon 132

Chapter 6 Selling the Quadroon 162

Epilogue Reimagining the Quadroon 188

Notes 199

Bibliography 237

Acknowledgments 261

Index 265

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

Absolutely riveting and nothing short of brilliant. This is a revelatory, important book.—Jane Dailey, University of Chicago

Editorial Reviews

“In her lively, comprehensive book, Clark broaches society’s historical fascination with quadroons. . . . [She] weaves real-life examples with an encyclopedic overview of the widespread effects both the American and Haitian Revolutions had on cultural perceptions of a nebulous social class.” — Publishers Weekly

“Richly-researched and compelling. . . . Dr. Clark’s work does not disappoint. Her scholarship clears away the smoke and pulls back the veils on much received wisdom, revealing just how empowered, and how impressive our women of color ancestors could be. . . . A page turner.” — Huffington Post Blog

“Clark tells a masterful story of the quadroon’s migration from the Caribbean to the United States, surfacing in Philadelphia, and settling in New Orleans. . . . Scholars will find this book fascinating.” — Early American Literature

“Clark’s thoroughly researched and beautifully written book replaces the simplistic and stereotypical accounts we have inherited from previous generations of scholars.” — American Historical Review

“A rich contribution to our understandings about the relationship between mythmaking and the creation of race, gender, and sex-based hierarchies in the Atlantic world.” — The Historian

“A book that historians of New Orleans and antebellum sexuality cannot ignore.” — Journal of Southern History

“Focused primarily on history but also incorporating literature, Clark creates a case study to explain the historical origins of New Orleans’ reputation as the exotic home of the almost mythical American ‘quadroon,’ often portrayed as the ‘tragic mulatto.’” — American Studies Journal

“Particularly well-written.” — Journal of American History

“Jump[ing] headlong into [the] intersection of history, memory and mythmaking. . . Clark offers a credible alternative history. . . [and] eloquent and persuasive evidence that race was not simply a byproduct of slavery’s racism, but was diligently and deliberately produced. It will surely prove impossible to look at the American quadroon the same way again.” — H-Law

“Clark has made a significant contribution to our understanding of the intertwined histories of race and gender in early New Orleans.” — Library Journal

From the Publisher