260 Culture, Identity, and Community: From Slavery to the PresentSlaves would oft en gather in rural settings and listen to fi ery
speeches by slave preachers and sang songs, which eventu-
ally developed into the form called Negro spiritual. Some
of the stylistic features of these musical expressions in slave
culture—for example, harmonization, singing in thirds,
emotionalism, and the call-and-response—are also pur-
ported to be some of the foundations of gospel music.
Slave culture has also left a rich legacy of literature and
writing. Some of the landmarks include the ballad Bars
Fight (1855) by Lucy Terry (circa 1730–1821), considered
the oldest known work in literature by an African Ameri-
can; Th e Narratives of the Uncommon Suff erings and Sur-
prising Deliverance of Britton Hammon, a Negro Man (1760)
by Britton Hammon (birth and death dates unknown), the
fi rst voyage account published by an African American; An
Evening Th ought, Salvation by Christ, with Penitential Cries
(1760) by Jupiter Hammon (1711–1806), the fi rst known
poem by an African American male; and On Messrs. Hussey
and Coffi n (1766) by Phillis Wheatley (1753–1784), an en-
slaved African in Boston who became the fi rst published
female African American poet. Th e slave narrative, a liter-
ary form used by former slaves to recount their stories of
oppression, is part of this impressive heritage.
See also: Africanisms; Animal Trickster Stories; Black Folk
Culture; Conjure; Ring Shout; Slave Diet; Slave Religion;
Wo r k S o n g sFernando A. OrtizBibliography
Blassingame, John. Th e Slave Community: Plantation Life in the
Antebellum South. New York: Oxford University Press, 1972.
Frazier, E. Franklin. Race and Culture Contacts in the Modern
World. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1957.
Herskovits, Melville. Th e Myth of the Negro Past. New York: Harper
and Brothers, 1941.
Levine, Lawrence. Black Culture and Black Consciousness. New
York: Oxford University Press, 1977.
Puckett, Niles Newbell. Folk Beliefs of the Southern Negro. 1926.
Reprint, Whitefi sh, MT: Kessinger Publishing, 2003.
Stuckey, Sterling. Slave Culture: Nationalist Th eory and the Foun-
dations of Black America. New York: Oxford University
Press, 1987.Slave Religion
Slave religion refers to the spiritual practices of enslaved
Americans who combined African culture and religionTh e breadth and depth of slave culture is extensive.
Slaves had a rich repertoire of folktales, which included
trickster tales and tales of metaphorpheses. Animals of Af-
rican ancestry were acculturated, and so the African hare
became Brer Rabbit, the jackal became the American fox,
and the tortoise became a turtle or terrapin. Th e structure
and purpose of folktales oft en answered why and how ques-
tions, as illustrated in the well-known tales Why the Liz-
ard Oft en Nods, Why the Owl Never Sleeps at Night, Why
Women Always Take Advantage of Men, and Why the Sister
in Black Works Hardest. John Wesley Blassingame (1940–
2000) noted that slave culture acted as a form of resistance
to enslavement and that this folklore lightened the burden
of oppression, promoted group solidarity, provided ways for
verbalizing anger, sustained hope, and built self-esteem. Th e
protagonists of these tales oft en outsmart the enemy and in-
spire unity, as in the story of Why the Hare Runs Away and
the King Buzzard tales. Joel Chandler Harris (1845–1908)
published Uncle Remus: Songs and Sayings (1880), which
contains the fi rst collection of these slave tales.
Slaves also retained and practiced some of their folk
arts and craft s at the plantations, such as sweetgrass basket-
weaving, quilting, and woodwork and metalwork. Slave
women oft en got together at night, aft er a day’s work in the
rice fi elds, to make warm and beautiful quilts. Quilting be-
came an occasion of social interaction as well as an occa-
sion of work, thus helping to ease the burden of bondage.
Th e North Star, crossroads, and the wagon wheel are some
celebrated quilting coded symbols used by slaves to mark
safe houses and escape routes on the Underground Railroad.
Male slaves living on the plantation became skilled craft smen
and craft ed beautiful and functional furniture from local
wood, oft en cypress and oak, as the intricate woodwork of
old plantation houses erected by slave labor still indicates.
Africans also brought music that served as an ex-
pression of hope and religious faith. In his autobiography
Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass (1845), Freder-
ick Douglass described how slaves would oft en sing while
working. Th ese work songs kept slaves working in rhythm
and are purported to be the source of the musical genre of
the blues. In many parts of Africa, music was not primar-
ily a form of entertainment but rather a means for people
to connect with each other and to communicate with the
spirit world. Chanting and singing were designed to facili-
tate such communication by creating trance states or in-
ducing a shared emotional climate among the participants.