Good words, Nancy. I should make one correction to my post below: Mary Livermore's sojourn in Virginia was at the beginning of the 1840s, not "in the late 1840s," as I mistakenly wrote. You can see some of the pages of Livermore's book online courtesy of Google Books at: http://tinyurl.com/2rnlvx Best wishes-- --Jurretta On Mar 3, 2007, at 1:14 PM, Sunshine49 wrote: > I was thinking the same thing, how beneficial these discussions have > been about white/ black/ native relations and situations, and how > extremely complex they are, once you scratch the surface. So much we > don't know about the other; so much we think we do know! I feel we've > learned a lot and cleared away some old misconceptions, or at least > agreed to disagree, something that, sadly, will never happen in the > larger culture, driven by the media as it is and the sound bites and > snappy headlines; no one will ever bother to look at the deeper > issues, the bigger picture, and come to any greater understanding. We > will continue to bicker, misunderstand and misjudge, as we have for so > long. > > Nancy > > > On Mar 3, 2007, at 12:52 PM, Jurretta Heckscher wrote: > >> Bravo, Kevin. May I say that this discussion has been impressive and >> heartening both for the humane erudition and for the respectful >> pedagogy it has elicited from so many on this list, professional >> historians and informed non-professionals alike. We have had the >> equivalent of a graduate seminar in historiography co-led by a >> particularly wise and skilled group of professors. I've been too >> busy to participate much, but every time I began to think I just had >> to add something, I'd see that someone else had said it already, and >> far better than I could have. >> >> The first and perhaps most important lesson I learned from my own >> mentor in the scholarship of slavery, James O. Horton, was never to >> forget or underestimate slavery's enormous human complexity. It's a >> lesson I hope we've all had reinforced on this thread. >> >> As I head out of town for several days, let me add just one more >> filament of evidence. It comes from the autobiography of Mary A. >> Livermore, a New England woman who lived for several years in the >> late 1840s on a wealthy Mecklenburg County, Va., plantation as a >> teacher for the plantation owner's children (and later distinguished >> herself as a journalist, suffragist, and lecturer). . . . . To subscribe, change options, or unsubscribe, please see the instructions at http://listlva.lib.va.us/archives/va-hist.html