How did slave-owning Southern planters make sense of the transformation of their world in the Civil War era? Matthew Pratt Guterl shows that they looked beyond their borders for answers. He traces the links that bound them to the wider fraternity of slaveholders in Cuba; Brazil; and elsewhere; and charts their changing political place in the hemisphere. Through such figures as the West Indian Confederate Judah Benjamin; Cuban expatriate Ambrosio Gonzales; and the exile Eliza McHatton; Guterl examines how the Southern elite connected―by travel; print culture; even the prospect of future conquest―with the communities of New World slaveholders as they redefined their world. He analyzes why they invested in a vision of the circum-Caribbean; and how their commitment to this broader slave-owning community fared. From Rebel exiles in Cuba to West Indian apprenticeship and the Black Codes to the “labor problem†of the postwar South; this beautifully written book recasts the nineteenth-century South as a complicated borderland in a pan-American vision.
#2223202 in Books 2012-06-04Original language:EnglishPDF # 1 .96 x 4.90 x 7.53l; .71 #File Name: 0674057880256 pages
Review
0 of 2 people found the following review helpful. One StarBy keehongnot much of visual aide.5 of 5 people found the following review helpful. Wonderful cultural/historical accountBy Prof. Christof KochWonderful cultural/historical account of thetwo colossal standing figures of Buddha in the Hindu Kush - along theSilk Road - in Afghanistan. These monumental statues; 53 and 35 metershigh; were hewn directly from sandstone cliffs in the 6. century CEand covered with stucco. Admired and written about by Chinese;Indian; Islamist and European travelers throughout the centuries; bothstatues were dynamites by the zelot Taliban in 2001. The author doesan outstanding job of analyzing the reception of travellers from manydistinct cultures to these statues - the biggest in the world -spending a lot of time on the French and the British spies; soldiersand classicists (often the same) around the time of the firstAnglo-Afghan war in 1840 and their misguided search for roots ofAlexander the Great ("Europe's favorite psychopath'' in the author'smemorable phrase). Ironically; the two empty shells left in thecliffside following their wanton destruction are; in some sense; moreauthentic Buddhist monuments than any physical statues.0 of 0 people found the following review helpful. Great intro to the giant BuddhasBy P. SternExcellent introduction -- concise; accessible; scholarly and information-packed; deeply sympathetic to its subject without falling prey to romanticism. Highly recommended! I just wish I had been able to see them ....
