Off Track: The Railroading of Antebellum Southern Economic History*.
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| Title: | Off Track: The Railroading of Antebellum Southern Economic History*. |
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| Authors: | Coclanis, Peter A.1 (AUTHOR) |
| Source: | Social Science Quarterly (Wiley-Blackwell). Sep2003, Vol. 84 Issue 3, p738-743. 6p. |
| Subject Terms: | *Research, *Ideology, *Theory of knowledge, Railroads, Slavery, Prices, Economic history |
| Abstract: | The article presents comments of the author on the article by "Rail Road Construction and Antebellum Slave Prices," by Mark A. Yanochik, Mark Thornton, and Bradley T. Ewing. In this article the three economists adopt, wittingly or not, much the same strategy. In this case an attempt is made to challenge or at least to complicate the conventional "story" of antebellum Southern economic history by focusing not on cotton-but on railroad construction, which the authors view as vital to explaining not only high slave prices in the 1850s but also the overall robustness of the Southern economy during that decade. Unfortunately, for a variety of reasons, this act of repositioning, of changing perspective is far less successful than the efforts mentioned above by Rousseau, the German Expressionists, Rhys, or Stoppard. Indeed, the most that can be said about the article is that it may help some, particularly the uninitiated, to appreciate more fully the degree to which cotton, slavery, transport improvements, and the role of the state were linked in the antebellum South. Most economic historians of the South, of course, have known this for some time. |
| Database: | Education Research Complete |
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| Abstract: | The article presents comments of the author on the article by "Rail Road Construction and Antebellum Slave Prices," by Mark A. Yanochik, Mark Thornton, and Bradley T. Ewing. In this article the three economists adopt, wittingly or not, much the same strategy. In this case an attempt is made to challenge or at least to complicate the conventional "story" of antebellum Southern economic history by focusing not on cotton-but on railroad construction, which the authors view as vital to explaining not only high slave prices in the 1850s but also the overall robustness of the Southern economy during that decade. Unfortunately, for a variety of reasons, this act of repositioning, of changing perspective is far less successful than the efforts mentioned above by Rousseau, the German Expressionists, Rhys, or Stoppard. Indeed, the most that can be said about the article is that it may help some, particularly the uninitiated, to appreciate more fully the degree to which cotton, slavery, transport improvements, and the role of the state were linked in the antebellum South. Most economic historians of the South, of course, have known this for some time. |
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| ISSN: | 00384941 |
| DOI: | 10.1111/1540-6237.8403015 |
