Product Description

The sequel to the award-winning Remembering Slavery, a groundbreaking book-and-CD set of interviews about the segregation-era South.

Remembering Jim Crow, the groundbreaking sequel to Remembering Slavery, is an extraordinary opportunity to read and hear the voices of black southerners who were firsthand witnesses to one of the most heartbreaking and troubling chapters in America's history. Based on interviews collected by the Behind the Veil project at Duke University's Center for Documentary Studies, this remarkable book-and-CD set presents for the first time the most extensive oral history ever recorded of African American life in the racially segregated South.

In vivid, compelling stories, men and women from all walks of life tell how their most ordinary activities were subjected to profound and unrelenting racial oppression—in the workplace, on street corners, and above all in the public facilities and institutions that systematically demeaned, disenfranchised, and disempowered black people, condemning them to second-class citizenship. At the same time, Remembering Jim Crow is a testament to how black southerners fought back against the system, raising children, building churches and schools, running businesses, and struggling for respect in a society that denied them the most basic rights. The result is a powerful story of survival enriched by vivid memories of individual, family, and community triumphs and tragedies.

Remembering Jim Crow is accompanied by two one-hour compact discs of the companion radio documentary produced by American RadioWorks. A transcript of the audio programs is included in the book's appendix, and the book is illustrated with fifty rare segregation-era photographs collected from African American families who participated in the oral history project. Boxed set: hardcover book with 2 one-hour compact discs; 50 black-and-white photographs.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #186144 in Books
• Published on: 2003-01-24
• Original language: English
• Dimensions: .1 pounds
• Binding: Paperback
• 1 pages

From Publishers Weekly
"Old people knew things that we'll probably never know," confides one interview subject in this viscerally powerful book and compact disc compilation of firsthand accounts of the Jim Crow era. Drawing on the 1,200 interviews with African-Americans that make up the Duke University collection called Behind the Veil: Documenting African American Life in the Jim Crow South, this sequel to the book-and-audio compilation Remembering Slavery offers testimonies by people from 25 communities in 10 states, representing diverse economic, social and cultural lifestyles urban and rural, industrial and agricultural, Piedmont and Delta. Readers and listeners will confront "the dailiness of the terror blacks experienced at the hands of capricious whites" and of "the capacity of the black community to come to each other's aid and invent means of sustaining the collective will to survive." The editors provide lucid historical context for recollections of family, work, school and church. "[S]tories of rapes and beatings, of houses burned to the ground and land stolen, of harrowing escapes in the middle of the night" appear alongside accounts of "the extraordinary and multiple ways in which resistance to Jim Crow occurred and was nourished." Some of the stories are so extreme as to seem absurd white singers mistakenly sent to a black club conceal themselves under pancake makeup; a county's average expenditure for white students is $40.68 per student, and for black students, $5.95. This moving, deeply instructive book reveals how "African Americans developed their own life, hidden and estranged from the lives of white people." Two one-hour compact discs, 50 b&w photos. Appendixes not seen by PW. (Nov.)Forecast: The award-winning Remembering Slavery attracted countless readers and listeners, partly because public radio stations broadcast the tapes. Expect a similar reception for this volume.

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal
This sequel to Remembering Slavery (LJ 9/1/98) is another effort to recover the history of black life in the American South, with interviews this time focusing on the era of segregation. It is a rare opportunity to read and hear the voices of black Southerners who experienced one of the most hideous periods in America's history, "a time of severe legal, economic, political, and social oppression, all reinforced by the pervasive threat of extralegal violence, especially lynching." Based on about 1200 interviews and in-depth research in 25 communities and ten different states undertaken by the Behind the Veil project at Duke University's Center for Documentary Studies, this remarkable book-and-CD set offers intimate views into the thoughts, activities, and anxieties of black Americans and at the same time strengthens our understanding of the Jim Crow era. Included are two one-hour CDs of the radio documentary produced by American Radio Works, a transcript of the audio program, 50 rare segregation-era photographs, biographical information, and suggestions for further reading. This superb primary source will appeal to public and academic libraries. Edward G. McCormack, Univ. of Southern Mississippi Gulf Coast Lib., Long Beach
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
Black Americans living in the South during its virulent segregation era render powerful eyewitness accounts of the brutal and demeaning American apartheid in this sequel to the groundbreaking work Remembering Slavery: African Americans Talk about Their Personal Experiences of Slavery and Freedom (1998). The book and accompanying CD present interviews with black southerners vividly recalling the everyday indignities of Jim Crow practices: separate drinking fountains, backdoor entries, separate seating, and grossly inferior treatment that sought to condemn blacks to second-class citizenship. Submission was expected and demanded, but many practices were egregious reminders of slavery. Black sharecroppers recall being forced to work white plantations with no pay. But the collection also recalls efforts--large and small--to resist Jim Crow, maintain personal dignity, and build strong communities in the midst of the oppressive system. Black businesses flourished as patrons sought to avoid contact with whites. The interviews were garnered from an archive of 1,300 oral histories collected by the Behind the Veil project at Duke University. One shocking revelation for many readers is the fact that some of these appalling practices continued well into the 1970s. This powerful recollection will be avidly sought by readers interested in America's racial history. Vernon Ford
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