Beyond Black and White: Cultural Approaches to Race and Slavery

Abstract

This Essay surveys the new field of cultural-legal history, highlighting its promise and pitfalls for the study of race and slavery. It discusses several aspects of the new cultural approaches: the view of trials as narratives or performances; the emphasis on the agency of outsiders to the law, including people of color and white women; and a household approach to slavery and other "domestic relations." The Essay argues that these studies have begun to transform historians' understandings of old debates regarding the origins and nature of American slavery, the beginnings of Jim Crow, and the possibilities of resistance against white cultural hegemony. While there are dangers to the new cultural approaches, in particular the loss of an all-encompassing framework to understand law, race and slavery, and the limitations of a black-white model, cultural-legal history also holds great promise for rethinking the role of law in racial formation, the nature of legal change, and the relationship between law and extralegal norms.

A historical and dignity‐centred perspective on Haiti's struggle for justice

“…Similarly, in the context of the administration of justice, Gross (2001) explains that during the US slave era the courtroom was one of the most public, official places where this lesson [of dishonour] was driven home. While not nearly as denigrating, it has been discussed that the Haitian courtroom too has traditionally been an alienating place for the country's poor.…”

“…In an effort to view the law from other perspectives, Gross (2001) suggests a merger in the study of cultural and legal history that focuses primarily on trial records. She uses the term cultural-legal history to describe this new field which she applied in the context of race and slavery in the antebellum US South.…”

“…Or was it a combination of all of these factors? Gross (2001) concludes that considering all of these factors offers the greatest understanding of law in action. The conviction of the chief of police was not the only important output of the Carrefour Feuilles trial.…”

Of Mandarins, Legal Consciousness, and the Cultural Turn in US Legal History: Robert W. Gordon. 1984. Critical Legal Histories. Stanford Law Review 36:57–125

“…7 7 My comments here are confined to North American legal historiography, which was the geographical focus of “Critical Legal Histories.” On cultural legal history, see generally Gross (2001) and Ross (1993). …”

“…8 8 For incisive surveys of legal historiography that bear out this point, produced by scholars who have themselves contributed significantly to these developments, see Ernst (1998), Gross (2000, 2001), Tomlins (1993, 1995, 2000, 2001, 2003), and Welke (2000, 2001, 2010). …”