At the heart of Eugene Genovese’s work, Roll Jordan, Roll, is the author’s interpretation of paternalism and hegemony in American slavery. For Genovese, paternalism was a two-way street between master and slave, an arrangement of responsibilities and mutual obligations not unlike a medieval feudal system. Slave masters expected work, productivity, and gratitude from their slaves in exchange for their protection, guidance, and patronage. On the other hand, slaves expected some sort of reciprocity from their masters for their work, according to Genovese. For example, slaves expected some level of autonomy to create communities and preserve their culture, as well as a reasonable standard of living (for a slave, at least). Enslaved blacks did manage to preserve some measure of privacy in their social interactions and family relations. Oddly, the author posits that black slaves negotiated paternalism on their own terms rather than on their masters’ terms; hence, slaves did not actually think that they should feel grateful for their masters’ patronage. Genovese suggests that enslaved blacks in essence rejected their status as slaves because slaves do not have any inherent rights or ability to control their own futures. Christianity played a role in this for it helped give slaves an expression of their dignity and humanity that whites could understand.
The author supports these interesting assertions with very detailed accounts of the interaction between masters and slaves, using both white accounts and slave testimonies and WPA narratives extensively. He notes that the quality of life for slaves on smaller plantations was very similar to that of their counterparts on large plantations; further, Genovese argues that slavery in the Deep South was not any more brutal than was slavery in the rest of the South. Most importantly, however, slaves, regardless of location or occupation, supposedly had the same consciousness and black identity as free blacks. This commonality is key because it supports Genovese’s argument that slave culture laid the groundwork for, or at least did not prevent the development of, a common black identity that would develop later. The author does not differentiate between those slaves who actively resisted and those who accommodated slavery, saying that resistance and accommodation were merely two sides of the survival process. One of Genovese’s aims in Roll, Jordan, Roll was to radically alter traditional views of master-slave relations and slave communities, giving slaves greater control over their own communities and affairs.[1]
Situating Denmark Vesey into Genovese’s account of slave life is an intriguing exercise at this point, particularly since the account of Vesey and his conspiracy have been under debate. Michael Johnson notes that Vesey’s conspiracy might not have actually been a conspiracy at all, for “rather than revealing a portrait of thwarted insurrection, witnesses’ testimony discloses glimpses of ways that reading and rumors transmuted white orthodoxies into black heresies.”[2] The emphasis of the narrative of Vesey’s conspiracy should be on the white reaction to the conspiracy, not on the failed revolt itself. (This is not unlike the account of slave conspiracy in Adams County, Mississippi, that Winthrop Jordan presents in Tumult and Silence at Second Creek, which shares some similarities.) Johnson argues that the previous historiography of Vesey, such as works by Egerton, Robertson, and Pearson, misread the court documents and paint an erroneous picture of Vesey. A rereading of Vesey’s story, however, would not substantially change the application of Genovese’s arguments in Roll, Jordan, Roll to Vesey’s conspiracy. Vesey, once a slave and then a free black, exhibits the black consciousness or identity that Genovese presents in his work, as well as some measure of autonomy and agency. As regards agency in Roll, Jordan, Roll, Walter Johnson says “there are a lot of things to say about the failings of Roll, Jordan, Roll, but the commonplace that it is a book which ignores the ‘agency’ of enslaved people…is not one of them.”[3] He argues, however, that Genovese’s notion of agency is more limited, because it makes a clear distinction between individual and collective agency. Regardless, Genovese appears to be correct in his assessment of enslaved agency, at least to a degree.
[1] Eugene Genovese, Roll, Jordan, Roll: The World the Slaves Made (New York: Vintage, 1976)
[2] Michael P. Johnson, “Denmark Vesey and His Co-Conspirators,” William and Mary Quarterly, 3rd. ser., 58, no. 4 (2001), 916.
[3] Walter Johnson, “On Agency,” Journal of Social History 37, no. 1 (Fall 2003), 117.