Paul, I cannot think of a single professional historian writing in the last 30 or 40 years who wrote about slavery that way. Yes, 90 or 100 years ago you got histories such as you describe. U.B. Phillips's American Negro Slavery, published in 1918 fits that model. That was a long time ago. Fogel and Engerman offered an economic analysis of slavery, including the "value" of what slaves "earned" -- food, housing etc. But they did not ignore to pain and cost of slavery. And, they were roundly criticized for the parts of their work that seemed to ignore the horrors of slavery. But, that was in the 1970s.
There may be non-professional historians who talk about the benefits of slavery and the happy well-fed slaves. These are often the same people who live with the fantasy of hundreds of thousands of slaves fighting for the Confederacy, or that masters (like Mr. Jefferson) did not have sex with their slaves. But don't confuse those people with serious historians.
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Paul Finkelman, Ph.D.
President William McKinley Distinguished Professor of Law
Albany Law School
80 New Scotland Avenue
Albany, NY 12208
518-445-3386 (p)
518-445-3363 (f)
[log in to unmask]
www.paulfinkelman.com
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________________________________________
From: Discussion of research and writing about Virginia history [[log in to unmask]] on behalf of Paul Heinegg [[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Thursday, May 10, 2012 12:24 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: [VA-HIST] Peculiar Institution
Many historians discuss slavery in terms of "Free food, a place to stay,
etc.," good or bad diet, good or bad physical treatment, rape, whether they
were treated as family members, etc. This ignores the most basic fact about
slavery. Slaves were their owners' property--like a chair, table, horse or
cow, an implement with which to farm. Not just the lowest stratum of human
society--not part of human society at all. Acknowledgement of this fact
enables us to understand why Emancipation was followed by Jim Crow, and even
today some in this country still have trouble accepting African Americans as
equals.
Paul
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