Donald Yacovone

America's Democratic Ordeal and the Forging of Our National Identity

Teaching White Supremacy

Born into Boston's elite and trained at Harvard University as a Unitarian minister, Samuel Joseph May rejected his upbringing to become a central figure in the antislavery and antebellum reform movements. With this intellectual biography, Donald Yacovone has written the first modern account of May's life. May's friendships with William Ellery Channing, William Lloyd Garrison, and Ralph Waldo Emerson, and his work in the major crusades of his era make his life a virtual history of antebellum religion and reform. Though his ideals threatened his clerical career and his family relationships, he feverishly devoted his life to the abolitionist, peace, and temperance movements, education reform, and women's rights.The Liberal Persuasion was an intellectual movement that arose out of New England during the golden age of the Unitarian faith. May was the leading representative of this humanist ideology that rejected slavery and racial prejudice, advanced free religious inquiry, promoted republicanism and a generous interpretation of civil liberties, supported the emancipation of women, and defended the social and political rights of the working classes. Author note: Donald Yacovone is a Research Associate at the Black Abolitionist Papers Project, Florida State University.

Samuel Joseph May and the Dilemmas of the Liberal Persuasion, 1797-1871

Laura Mccall

Only by focusing on the similarities, as well as the differences, in the lives of men and women can we achieve a fully representative portrait. However, shared experiences and complementary lives of men and women have rarely been considered in historical inquiry. This important new anthology, reflecting recent trends in the history of men and women calls for the reintegration of the study of gender.

Men, Women, and the History of Gender

A Shared Experience

Presents a collection of primary documents by African Americans describing their experiences and perspectives of the Civil War.

African American Voices of the Civil War

Freedom's Journey

Henry Louis Gates Jr.

From acclaimed scholar Henry Louis Gates, Jr., the most comprehensive collection of Lincoln's writings on race and slavery Generations of Americans have debated the meaning of Abraham Lincoln's views on race and slavery. He issued the Emancipation Proclamation and supported a constitutional amendment to outlaw slavery, yet he also harbored grave doubts about the intellectual capacity of African Americans, publicly used the n-word until at least 1862, and favored permanent racial segregation. In this book—the first complete collection of Lincoln's important writings on both race and slavery—readers can explore these contradictions through Lincoln's own words. Acclaimed Harvard scholar and documentary filmmaker Henry Louis Gates, Jr., presents the full range of Lincoln's views, gathered from his private letters, speeches, official documents, and even race jokes, arranged chronologically from the late 1830s to the 1860s. Complete with definitive texts, rich historical notes, and an original introduction by Henry Louis Gates, Jr., this book charts the progress of a war within Lincoln himself. We witness his struggles with conflicting aims and ideas—a hatred of slavery and a belief in the political equality of all men, but also anti-black prejudices and a determination to preserve the Union even at the cost of preserving slavery. We also watch the evolution of his racial views, especially in reaction to the heroic fighting of black Union troops. At turns inspiring and disturbing, Lincoln on Race and Slavery is indispensable for understanding what Lincoln's views meant for his generation—and what they mean for our own.

Lincoln on Race and Slavery

Henry Louis Gates, Jr.

The African Americans: Many Rivers to Cross is the companion book to the six-part, six-hour documentary of the same name. The series is the first to air since 1968 that chronicles the full sweep of 500 years of African American history, from the origins of slavery on the African continent and the arrival of the first black conquistador, Juan Garrido, in Florida in 1513, through five centuries of remarkable historic events right up to Barack Obama’s second term as president, when the United States still remains deeply divided by race and class. The book explores these topics in even more detail than possible in the television series, and examines many other fascinating matters as well, guiding readers on an engaging journey through the Black Atlantic world—from Africa and Europe to the Caribbean, Latin America, and the United States—to shed new light on what it has meant, and means, to be an African American. By highlighting the complex internal debates and class differences within the black experience in this country, readers will learn that the African American community, which black abolitionist Martin R. Delany described as a "nation within a nation," has never been a truly uniform entity, and that its members have been debating their differences of opinion and belief from their very first days in this country. The road to freedom for black people in America has not been linear; rather, much like the course of a river, it has been full of loops and eddies, slowing and occasionally reversing current. Ultimately, this book emphasizes the idea that African American history encompasses multiple continents and venues, and must be viewed through a transnational perspective to be fully understood.

The African Americans

Henry Louis Gates (Jr.)

Chronicles five hundred years of African-American history from the origins of slavery on the African continent through Barack Obama's second presidential term, examining contributing political and cultural events.

Donald Yacovone

About

Books

Join the club