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Rituals of Blood: Consequences of Slavery in Two American Centuries
Rituals of Blood Consequences of Slavery in Two American Centuries Author:Orlando Patterson In Rituals of Blood, National Book Award-winner Orlando Patterson examines the extensive cultural consequences of slavery and Jim Crow for today's Afro-Americans and for our society as a whole. In three interlocking essays, never before published, Patterson looks to history to explain the deeply strained relations between Afro-American men and w... more »omen and the complex array of images of the Afro-American male in modern culture. Patterson is widely acknowledged as a leading scholar on the history, sociology, and culture of Americans descended from slaves. He believes that male-female relations among Afro-Americans languish in a chronic state of crisis-a crisis that lies at the heart of the social tragedy besetting the bottom third of the Afro-American population. In the first essay, Patterson analyzes the very latest survey data to delineate the different attitudes, behaviors, and circumstances of Afro-American men and women, dissecting both the external and internal causes for the great disparities he finds. In the second essay, Patterson focuses on the lynching of Afro-American boys and men during the decades after Reconstruction, particularly on the substantial number of cases that constituted apparent ritual human sacrifice. As no one has done before, Patterson reveals how the complex interplay between Christian sacrificial symbolism and the deep recesses of post-bellum Southern culture resulted in some of the most shameful, barbaric events in American history. The third essay brings us into the late twentieth century, with an investigation of the various images of Afro-American men portrayed by the media. From the demigod (Michael Jordan) to the demon (Colin Ferguson) to the demigod-turned-demon (O. J. Simpson) and the crossers of racial and gender boundaries (Michael Jackson and Dennis Rodman)-all contribute to the cultural complications of our contemporary society. Patterson's highly original vision and historical perspective were repeatedly mentioned in reviews of his 1997 book, The Ordeal of Integration. Rituals of Blood advances his new model of ethnic relations that opens American society to a new and freer dialogue.« less