Honor and Slavery: Lies, Duels, Noses, Masks, Dressing as a Woman, Gifts, Strangers, Humanitarianism, Death, Slave Rebellions, The Proslavery Argument, Baseball, Hunting, and Gambling in the Old South by Kenneth S. Greenberg (Review)

Honor and Slavery: Lies, Duels, Noses, Masks, Dressing as a Woman, Gifts, Strangers, Humanitarianism, Death, Slave Rebellions, The Proslavery Argument, Baseball, Hunting, and Gambling in the Old South by Kenneth S. Greenberg (Princeton University Press, 1996)

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Honor and Slavery: Lies, Duels, Noses, Masks, Dressing as a Woman, Gifts, Strangers, Humanitarianism, Death, Slave Rebellions, The Proslavery Argument, Baseball, Hunting, and Gambling in the Old South by Kenneth S. Greenberg (Review)

by Catherine Clinton
Southern Cultures, Vol. 4, No. 3: Fall 1998

Princeton University Press, 1996

“Lies, Duels, Noses, Masks, Dressing as a Woman, Gifts, Strangers, Humanitarianism, Death, Slave Rebellions, The Proslavery Argument, Baseball, Hunting, and Gambling in the Old South”: What’s not to love about a subtitle like this? But even if we love it, what in the world is the author trying to do? Reviews of Ken Greenberg’s Honor and Slavery acknowledge that the book is so full of playful, powerful connections that it can make readers dizzy and scholars faint. It remains the sign of an original book that reviewers leap to extremes to describe it. Some find Greenberg winning, others wanting. Some denounce him for errors, while others anoint him.

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