The Problem of Slavery in Western Culture

By David Brion Davis

Book Overview

Winner of several national awards including the 1967 Pulitzer Prize, this classic study by David Brion Davis has given new direction to the historical and sociological research of society's attitude towards slavery.
Davis depicts the various ways different societies have responded to the intrinsic contradictions of slavery from antiquity to the early 1770's in order to establish the uniqueness of the abolitionists' response. While slavery has always caused considerable social and psychological tension, Western culture has associated it with certain religious and philosophical doctrines that gave it the highest sanction. The contradiction of slavery grew more profound when it became closely linked with American colonization, which had as its basic foundation the desire and opportunity to create a more perfect society. Davis provides a comparative analysis of slave systems in the Old World, a discussion of the early attitudes towards American slavery, and a detailed exploration of the early protests against Negro bondage, as well as the religious, literary, and philosophical developments that contributed to both sides in the controversies of the late eighteenth century. This exemplary introduction to the history of slavery in Western culture presents the traditions in thought and value that gave rise to the attitudes of both abolitionists and defenders of slavery in the late eighteenth century as well as the nineteenth century.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0195056396
• ISBN13: 9780195056396
• Release Date: October 1988
• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Length: 528 Pages
• Weight: 1.32 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.3" x 5.0" x 8.0"

Customer Reviews

HISTORY FOR HISTORIANS

THIS IS A GREAT BOOK IF YOU ARE INTERESTED IN THE SUBJECT OF SLAVERY AND ANTI-SLAVERY. THE AUTHOR, WITHOUT QUESTION ONE OF OUR GREATEST HISTORIANS OF THE SUBJECT, GOES BEYOND THE ARTIFICIAL LINE OF THE CALANDER IN RELATION TO OUR CIVIL WAR AND OFFERS AN INSIGHTFUL VIEW OF THE EFFECT OF SLAVERY IN THE PERIOD LEADING UP TO THE FOUNDING OF OUR COUNTRY. tHIS IS A GREAT BOOK FOR THE SERIOUS STUDENT, NOT FOR THE CASUAL READER.

Pulitzer Prize winner

This work won the 1967 Pulitzer prize for general non-fiction. Since other winners of that prize, e.g., The Guns of August(in 1963), The Making of the President, 1960,(in 1962--the first Pulitzer in this category) The Rising Sun (in 1971), and The Making of the Atomic Bomb (in 1988) have been very enjoyable reads, I decided to read this work. The topic is of interest,, but the author grubs in pre-1776 writing a lot, and I did not find I was caught up in the subject, important tho it is. The treatment is deep in theory, and intellectual history, and while at times this has interested me, I could not find myself enamored by the book--which is a reflection on me, not on the very erudite author.