Return to Bibliography

Vlach, John Michael.  Back of the Bighouse: The Architecture of Plantation Slavery.  Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 1993.  258 p.  Many black and white photographs and architectural drawings.  Extensive Notes and Index sections.

Anthropologist and folklorist John Michael Vlach takes a discerning look at the built plantation environment in which African American slaves were forced to work and live. Vlach has written extensively on African American decorative arts and material culture and has curated many exhibits on related issues, including a temporary show at the Washington Martin Luther King Library based in large part on the research contained in this book.  Vlach focuses on the landscape and culture of slaves in order to shift attention away from the historically romanticized architectural and decorative world of the vast plantation mansion.  The effect of this deconstruction is to shatter the myth of the Big House and slave owner as being central to the success of the plantation itself.  He uses a wide array of resources to document how slaves were able to develop the means to adjust to, and even transform, their plantation environment.  The book features over 200 photographs and drawings from the Historic American Buildings Survey, as well as narratives and interviews of former slaves recorded by the Federal Writers Project in the 1930s.  Each of the book’s thirteen chapters focuses on a specific type of plantation architecture or spatial construction, such as plantation yards, kitchens, smokehouses, barns and stables, and outbuildings.  Vlach skillfully demonstrates how slaves were able to hold onto aspects of their African culture and identity, while maintaining hope and independence in the face of oppression.  This book is highly recommended to all types of scholars and individuals with an interest in history, slavery, material culture, and architecture. [J. Kille]