Hostname: page-component-77c89778f8-vpsfw Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-07-19T18:55:55.306Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Herbert Gutman’s The Black Family in Slavery and Freedom, 1750-1925: A Cliometric Reconsideration

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 January 2016

Warren C. Sanderson*
Affiliation:
Stanford University

Extract

Gutman’s study of the black family is one of those books which serve as a constant inspiration to academics. In those dreary moments when we wrestle with a particularly subtle point or phrase, a fleeting question occurs to most of us. How many people will really appreciate the depth of our thinking or the way in which the prose really captures the essence of the phenomenon being explained? But when such pernicious thoughts disturb our concentration, the example of Gutman’s work can banish them, for this book has had more reviewers than some technical pieces have had serious readers. Indeed the November 1978 SSHA session indicates that it still continues. Not only has Gutman’s book been seriously read and pondered, but there are a substantial number of pages in print to indicate that all the subtleties have been duly appreciated.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Social Science History Association 1979

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Becker, G. S. (1974) “A theory of marriage,” in Schultz, T. W. (ed.) Economics of the Family. Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Becker, G. S., Landes, E. M., and Michael, R. T. (1977) “Economics of marital instability.” J. of Pol. Economy 85 (December): 11411187.Google Scholar
Coale, A. J. and Demeny, P. (1966) Regional Model Life Tables and Stable Populations. Princeton: Princeton Univ. Press.Google Scholar
Coale, A. J. and Rives, N. W. Jr. (1973) “A statistical reconstruction of the black population of the United States 1880-1970: estimates of true numbers by age and sex, birth rates, and total fertility.” Population Index 39 (January): 336.Google Scholar
Engerman, S. (1978) “Black fertility and family structure in the U.S., 1880-1940.” J. of Family History 2 (June): 117138.Google Scholar
Gutman, H. (1976) The Black Family in Slavery and Freedom, 1750-1925. New York: Pantheon Books.Google Scholar
Hannan, M., Tuma, N., and Groeneveld, L. P. (1976) “The impact of income maintenance on the making and breaking of marital unions: interim report.” Center for the Study of Welfare Policy, Stanford Research Institute, Research memorandum 28 (June).Google Scholar
Honig, M. (1974) “AFDC income, recipient rates, and family dissolution.” J. of Human Resources 9 (Summer): 303322.Google Scholar
Ransom, R. L. and Sutch, R. (1977) One Kind of Freedom. Cambridge, MA: Cambridge Univ. Press.Google Scholar
Ross, H. L. and Sawhill, I. V. (1965) Time of Transition, the Growth of Families Headed by Women. Washington, DC: The Urban Institute.Google Scholar
Sanderson, W. (1979) An economic interpretation of racial differentials in rates of marital stability from Reconstruction to the first world war. (unpublished)Google Scholar
Shryock, H. S., Seigel, J. S., and Associates (1973) The Methods and Materials of Demography, vol. 2, 2nd printing (rev.). Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.Google Scholar
U.S. Bureau of the Census (1972) 1970 Census of Population, Subject Reports, Marital Status. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.Google Scholar
U.S. Bureau of the Census (1962) Census of Population: 1960, Subject Reports, Marital Status. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.Google Scholar
U.S. Bureau of the Census (1953) Census of Population: 1950, Volume II, Characteristics of the Population, Part 1, United States Summary. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.Google Scholar
U.S. Bureau of the Census (1947) Population, Differential Fertility 1940 and 1910, Fertility by Duration of Marriage. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.Google Scholar
U.S. Bureau of the Census (1945) Sixteenth Census of the United States: 1940, Population, Differential Fertility 1940 and 1910, Women by Number of Children Ever Born. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.Google Scholar
U.S. Bureau of the Census (1943) Sixteenth Census of the United States: 1940, Population, Volume 4, Characteristics by Age, Part I : United States Summary. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.Google Scholar
U.S. Bureau of the Census (1913) Thirteenth Census of the United States, Volume 1, Population, 1910: General Report and Analysis. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.Google Scholar
U.S., Department of Labor, Office of Policy Planning and Research (1965) The Negro Family: The Case for National Action. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.Google Scholar
U.S., Office of Management and Budget (1977) Social Indicators, 1976. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.Google Scholar