Slavery by Another Name

The Re-Enslavement of Black Americans from the Civil War to World War II

De: Douglas A. Blackmon

Narrado por: Dennis Boutsikaris

Pulitzer Prize, General Nonfiction, 2009

In this groundbreaking historical expose, Douglas A. Blackmon brings to light one of the most shameful chapters in American history: an Age of Neoslavery that thrived from the aftermath of the Civil War through the dawn of World War II.

Using a vast record of original documents and personal narratives, Douglas A. Blackmon unearths the lost stories of slaves and their descendants who journeyed into freedom after the Emancipation Proclamation and then back into the shadow of involuntary servitude shortly thereafter.

By turns moving, sobering, and shocking, this unprecedented account reveals the stories of those who fought unsuccessfully against the re-emergence of human labor trafficking, the companies that profited most from neoslavery, and the insidious legacy of racism that reverberates today.

©2009 Douglas A. Blackmon (P)2010 Audible, Inc.

Reseñas de la Crítica

“Shocking....Eviscerates one of our schoolchildren's most basic assumptions: that slavery in America ended with the Civil War.” ( The New York Times)

“The genius of Blackmon's book is that it illuminates both the real human tragedy and the profoundly corrupting nature of the Old South slavery as it transformed to establish a New South social order.” ( The Atlanta Journal-Constitution)

Unrealistically revealing

It's scary to know the history given to us through education is but a glossy finish to what actually happened. I am an African-American and it makes my heart heavy that I've never acknowledged my predecessors properly. After reading this one can only imagine the torment and hopelessness prior generations had to endure just so I could do things as simple as writing this review. I do not hate white people, not even a little bit. I do however, feel the need to pass this information along. I recommend this book to anyone grounded in this country.

American History

This is book does a powerful job illuminating a poorly covered piece of American history. I listened to this as part of a series of books about the African American experience. It's a difficult subject to hear, but an incredibly important one when you consider that slavery didn't end effectively until 1945.

rivoting

details and documents a history most of us are never taught and our nation fails to recognise

Great book!

This was very well put together! He really goes in depth on the continued slavery. I had no idea this continued for as long as it did.

Every American should read this book

Great investigative reporting. The author does a good job explaining a painful topic that needs to confronted by all Americans. Using an engaging narrative, he brings to life what would otherwise be dry, but hair raising facts and statistics about the forced labor system in the south. Since the prison labor system existed for nearly a 100 years and he goes through it chronologically, there are times when it gets a bit repetative. But he brings the book to a thoughtful close, which leaves one thinking about how we should go forward from here.

Wow, what a telling story!

Listening to this audiobook gave me so much insight into the complex and heinous beginnings of our current policing system in the United States. I think it should be required reading in the criminal justice programs taught today.

Ignorance is no Excuse

In a review of “Separate”, Steve Luxenburg’s commendable history of the Plessy v Ferguson decision, I wrote that there was still a need for a similarly thorough treatment of the Jim Crow era that followed that decision.

I was wrong. Douglas Blackmon’s book is a definitive treatment of the postbellum re-subjugation of African Americans in the south. The history is both readable and scholarly; it is both condensed and detailed. It does not take the reader long to understand how the horrifically efficient convict labor system was used to return vast numbers of black citizens to involuntary servitude. And yet Blackmon adds case after well-researched, specific case to demonstrate how this system persisted for 80 years after the end of the Civil War.

Q.E.D. By the end of the book, there can be no rebuttal to Blackmon’s contention that in the United States, “real slavery did not end until 1945.” Nor can the reader “wonder as to the origins, depth, and visceral foundations of so many African-Americans’ fundamental distrust of our judicial processes.”

This book reset my thinking on race relations, on affirmative action programs, on Black Lives Matter movements, on reparations. I don’t know how I’ll eventually work these issues out, but henceforward my thinking will be based on a fundamentally more honest and sympathetic acknowledgement of proximal white responsibility for the tragic and chronic inter-racial dysfunction that plagues this country.

WoW!What A Story!

I so appreciate the research and work that went into Mr. Blackmons story that actually is a good history lesson. He brings to life the experiences of the African Americans affected by terrors of convict leasing and the judicial prejudice. He also gives us a look inside the economy and businesses that play a role in the success of the terrorization of the people. This book is one thst could lend to the discussions of reparations and reconciling the issues of post slavery in America.

History being repeated.

This book was recommended by a dear friend. I think I felt every emotion while listening. I've just finish and I'm sobbing. It inspires me to continue my volunteering with a new fervor. As I prepare to leave the south, I recognize the undertones in this state I was born in still harbors a superiority attitude and it is reflected by most of our local elected representatives. The antics they pull are history being repeated.

Magnificent

Great Narrator, thank your for your work and insight. this is vital information and knowledge.