The Holy Land of Matrimony: The Complex Legacy of the Broomstick Wedding in American History
@article{Parry2016TheHL, title={The Holy Land of Matrimony: The Complex Legacy of the Broomstick Wedding in American History}, author={Tyler Dunsdon Parry}, journal={American Studies}, year={2016}, volume={55}, pages={106 - 81} }
Many enslaved people in North America married by jumping the broomstick, but following their emancipation in 1865 most newly freed African Americans discarded the tradition. They believed it held embarrassing reminders of a period when black relationships were widely disrespected. By the late twentieth century, however, the custom recaptured African American interest, building on the popularity of scholarly literature and popular movements that emphasized the unique cultural traditions of…
References
SHOWING 1-10 OF 155 REFERENCES
The Wedding Complex: Forms of Belonging in Modern American Culture
- Art
- 2002
In The Wedding Complex Elizabeth Freeman explores the significance of the wedding ceremony by asking what the wedding becomes when you separate it from the idea of marriage. Freeman finds that…
Married in Slavery Time: Jumping the Broom in Atlantic Perspective
- History
- 2015
In 1839 Mary Ashton Rice accepted a position as a schoolteacher on a Virginia plantation. As a Boston native, Rice had not been previously exposed to chattel slavery, but during her three-year tenure…
Bosses and Broomsticks: Ritual and Authority in Antebellum Slave Weddings
- History
- 2009
IN DECEMBER 1861 A WOMAN WITNESSED A WEDDING THAT TO SOME eyes would have been indistinguishable from the weddings of white slaveholders. The ceremony took place in a plantation church in Camden,…
Shared Traditions: SOUTHERN HISTORY AND FOLK CULTURE
- History
- 1999
Grounded in Charles Joyner's unique blend of rigorous scholarship and genuine curiosity, these thoughtful and incisive essays by the eminent southern historian and folklorist explore the South's…
Slave Breeding: Sex, Violence, and Memory in African American History
- History
- 2012
A thought-provoking piece of scholarship that sheds light on the complex history of slave breeding in America. Smithers s book will be hotly debated in the profession. Michael L. Ondaatje, University…
Stylin': African American Expressive Culture from Its Beginnings to the Zoot Suit
- History
- 1998
Stylin': African American Expressive Culture from Its Beginnings to the Zoot Suit. By Shane White and Graham White. (Ithaca, N.Y., and London: Cornell University Press, 1998. Pp. xviii, 301. $30.00,…
The Wedding Complex: Forms of Belonging in Modern American Culture
- Art
- 2003
The Wedding Complex: Forms of Belonging in Modern American Culture. Elizabeth Freeman. Durham, NC: Duke University Press. 2002. 288 pp. ISBN 0-822-32989-1. $19.95 (paper). What does it mean when so…
The World They Made Together: Black and White Values in Eighteenth-Century Virginia
- History
- 1988
In the recent past, enormous creative energy has gone into the study of American slavery, with major explorations of the extent to which African culture affected the culture of black Americans and…
White Weddings: Romancing Heterosexuality in Popular Culture
- Art
- 2001
From sitcoms and soap operas to talk shows and movies, Americans are in love with the idea of a white wedding. The happy bride and groom smile from the covers of fashion and entertainment magazines,…
Swing the Sickle for the Harvest is Ripe: Gender and Slavery in Antebellum Georgia
- History
- 2007
Examining how labor and economy shaped the family life of bondwomen and bondmen in the antebellum South \u0022Swing the Sickle for the Harvest Is Ripe\u0022 compares the work, family, and economic…