Black Culture and Black Consciousness: Afro-American Folk Thought from Slavery to Freedom [Paperback]

the late Lawrence W. Levine (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 019530568X | ISBN-13: 978-0195305685 | Publication Date: April 27, 2007 | Edition: 30th anniversary

When Black Culture and Black Consciousness first appeared thirty years ago, it marked a revolution in our understanding of African American history. Contrary to prevailing ideas at the time, which held that African culture disappeared quickly under slavery and that black Americans had little group pride, history, or cohesiveness, Levine uncovered a cultural treasure trove, illuminating a rich and complex African American oral tradition, including songs, proverbs, jokes, folktales, and long narrative poems called toasts--work that dated from before and after emancipation. The fact that these ideas and sources seem so commonplace now is in large part due this book and the scholarship that followed in its wake. A landmark work that was part of the "cultural turn" in American history, Black Culture and Black Consciousness profoundly influenced an entire generation of historians and continues to be read and taught. For this anniversary reissue, Levine wrote a new preface reflecting on the writing of the book and its place within intellectual trends in African American and American cultural history.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Must be read by all who would understand the Afro-American experience and American culture in general." --Eugene D. Genovese

"Through an exhaustive investigation of black songs, folk tales, proverbs, aphorisms, verbal games and the long narrative oral poems known as 'toasts,' Levine argues that the value system of Afro-Americans can only be understood through an analysis of black culture.... His work ranks among the best books written on the Afro-American experience in recent years." --Al-Tony Gilmore, The Washington Post

About the Author

The late Lawrence W. Levine was Margaret Byrne Professor of History Emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley, and Professor of History and Cultural Studies at George Mason University in Virginia. A former MacArthur fellow and a Past President of the Organization of American Historians, he was the author of a number of books, among them The Unpredictable Past: Explorations in American Cultural History, Highbrow/Lowbrow, and The People & the President: America's Extraordinary Conversation with FDR

Product Details

• Paperback: 560 pages
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA; 30th anniversary edition (April 27, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 019530568X
• ISBN-13: 978-0195305685
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.4 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.7 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #54,901 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

25 of 25 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Amazing, December 4, 2003

By 

Jeffrey Leach (Omaha, NE USA) - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Black Culture and Black Consciousness: Afro-American Folk Thought from Slavery to Freedom (Galaxy Books) (Paperback)

In his impressive study of the African-American experience in America, "Black Culture and Black Consciousness: Afro-American Folk Thought from Slavery to Freedom," author Lawrence Levine assembles a vast collection of songs, jokes, medicine, tales, music, and humor to argue against the once widely held notion that slavery reduced blacks to a state of hopeless degradation, completely dissipated their African heritage, and left them largely dependent on white cultural norms. According to Levine, not only did blacks possess a culture and consciousness independent of the dominant white society, but this culture was extraordinarily complex and capable of constantly changing to fit the latest challenges confronting both white and black society. The author claims that up to the time of emancipation, slaves' oral communications created a "sacred" world that transcended bondage and went beyond the control of their white overlords. African influences consisting of "call and response" song and the reversal of the social hierarchy through stories remained important in all aspects of black life in the antebellum South, eventually informing spirituals, folk medicine, and story creation. When blacks told tales about the animal world, or sang songs with a spiritual focus, doing so created a sense of inclusive community while constructing a cosmology that gave blacks an important place in the unity of the physical world.

This sacred world gave way to increasing secularization after emancipation when blacks assimilated some white influences during the move from the plantation to larger society. Since white society still limited the roles of blacks in society, the result of freedom was a cultural dualism, or the "double consciousness" articulated by W.E.B. DuBois, which Levine best expresses when he studies how blacks spoke the English language. When dealing with whites, blacks tended to communicate using proper English language forms. Among their own people they spoke using distinctive black constructions. Rather than seeing this as devious or ignorant, as many whites did during that time, the author sees this as a way blacks maintained their own identity during the heady days of freedom when white culture threatened to overwhelm their traditions. Blacks did adopt some white cultural ideas, which Levine rigorously outlines through the study of such diverse fields as hero stories and blues music, but they never accepted them at the expense of their own traditions. The blues particularly presented a significant challenge for the black community because this form of expression closely mirrored many aspects of white music: individual singing versus group singing and the creation of songs based on an individual's experiences and problems. The author argues that while blues did employ some white musical elements, the problems often articulated in the songs dealt with concerns affecting the entire black population. Moreover, blues music helped spread a sense of community through the wide distribution of recorded songs.

Particularly impressive in Levine's study, aside from the massive amount of material he collected and synthesized, is his study of the trickster tales. It is here, in the widely circulated black tales about Brer Rabbit and other denizens of the animal world, that African-American culture related a plethora of different meanings to changing times. "Black Culture and Black Consciousness" teases out multiple definitions from these ostensibly simple tales, showing how blacks imbued the stories with lessons about patience, the weak versus the strong, the value of listening, and the importance of marriage among many others. Most relevant is how these stories did not merely fall into a "hate the white man" mold, but reflected the broad concerns and hopes of an entire community. The trickster tales, in Levine's masterful hands, reveal that blacks often shared the same concerns about life that white people did. A superficial examination of the stories, as it seems many have made over the years, does not reveal the depth and breadth of the human experience contained within the tales. The author works wonders with these stories.

As difficult as it is to criticize a work that accomplishes such a masterful fusion of diverse sources, Levine does make a few omissions. He introduces, for example, the concept of black toasts without discussing the origins of this rhyming wordplay. Were there other forms of black oral traditions that the author failed to analyze? Unfortunately, black religious sermons receive little attention from this scholar. Religion played an enormous role in African-American oral tradition, as evidenced in the examinations of spirituals and gospel music in the book. Where did the pulpit fit into the development and maintenance of culture and consciousness? We know from the this book, along with Mia Bay's examination of ex-slave testimony, that black preachers existed and were important figures respected by black people as far back as the first conversions of African-Americans to Christianity. Black religious figures continued to exert considerable influence on their communities after emancipation. Even today, some black religious services easily conform to the modes of communication outlined in Levine's book, especially the African "call and response" patterns used in slave spiritual songs.

Moreover, black newspapers created after the freeing of the slaves also served to unite the black community and functioned as a center of cultural consciousness. "Chicago Defender," a black newspaper, spoke out against problems confronting black people in the early part of the twentieth century. The paper also played a vital role in encouraging southern blacks to migrate to the North around the time of World War I. Black periodicals like the "Chicago Defender," regrettably unexamined by this book, fits the author's definition of black ethnicity after emancipation: adopting a white idea and melding the concept with black cultural concerns.

4.0 out of 5 stars Reading is fundamental!, November 14, 2011

By 

Michael Felder (Florida, United States of America) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Black Culture and Black Consciousness: Afro-American Folk Thought from Slavery to Freedom (Paperback)

The book is very imformative, and explains alot about the culture and history of African Americans. It was used frequently during my studies in college for my history classes.

5.0 out of 5 stars Monumental, April 19, 2010

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Maxtone Witherball - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Black Culture and Black Consciousness: Afro-American Folk Thought from Slavery to Freedom (Paperback)

Black Culture and Black Consciousness is a hugely ambitious--and hugely successful--exploration of the folk beliefs, rituals, religion, music, tales, and humor of black Americans both before and after the Civil War (the "to Freedom" part of the subtitle is a bit misleading, as the book reaches more than halfway into the 20th century). The study is beautifully organized, never losing focus or direction despite the myriad, multifaceted subjects it treats in depth. And while the insights Levine draws could have easily, given the enormity of the task before him, been or grown superficial, or simply reiterated other scholars' incomplete or erroneous inferences, they are nothing but scrupulously nuanced, sensitive, and often, truly revelatory. Bold yet carefully circumscribed, they invariably have the ring of truth.

Take folk heroes, for example. White folk heroes like Jesse James and Pretty Boy Floyd, Levine notes a colleague as saying, are essentially reactionary, preying on new, disruptive institutions like railroads and banks. Levine, having shown that such "social bandits" were generally absent from black folk thought, while nihilistic "bad men" like Stagolee and Railroad Bill were immensely popular, concludes that this was because black people had no "good old days" to be nostalgic for. Clearly, I've failed to even begin to do justice to Levine's intellect and accomplishments. But suffice it to say, Black Culture and Black Consciousness is massively erudite, superbly written, and a fabulous resource for anyone interested in the continuum of ante- and postbellum African-American thought, as reflected in religious and secular song, story, and other folk conveyances.