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The Fugitive's Properties: Law and the Poetics of Possession
by Stephen M. Best
- Used
- as new
- Paperback
- first
- Condition
- As New
- ISBN 10
- 0226044343
- ISBN 13
- 9780226044347
- Seller
-
Brooktondale, New York, United States
Payment Methods Accepted
About This Item
First printing. Softcover volume, measuring approximately 6" x 9", is like new. xii/362 pages.
"In this study of literature and law before and since the Civil War, Stephen M. Best shows how American conceptions of slavery, property, and the idea of the fugitive were profoundly interconnected. "The Fugitive's Properties" uncovers a poetics of intangible, personified property emerging out of antebellum laws, circulating through key nineteenth-century works of literature, and informing cultural forms such as blackface minstrelsy and early race films. Best also argues that legal principles dealing with fugitives and indebted persons provided a sophisticated precursor to intellectual property law as it dealt with rights in appearance, expression, and other abstract aspects of personhood. In this conception of property as fleeting, indeed fugitive, American law preserved for much of the rest of the century slavery's most pressing legal imperative: the production of personhood as a market commodity. By revealing the paradoxes of this relationship between fugitive slave law and intellectual property law, Best helps us to understand how race achieved much of its force in the American cultural imagination. A work of ambitious scope and compelling cross-connections, "The Fugitive's Properties" sets new agendas for scholars of American literature and legal culture."
"In this study of literature and law before and since the Civil War, Stephen M. Best shows how American conceptions of slavery, property, and the idea of the fugitive were profoundly interconnected. "The Fugitive's Properties" uncovers a poetics of intangible, personified property emerging out of antebellum laws, circulating through key nineteenth-century works of literature, and informing cultural forms such as blackface minstrelsy and early race films. Best also argues that legal principles dealing with fugitives and indebted persons provided a sophisticated precursor to intellectual property law as it dealt with rights in appearance, expression, and other abstract aspects of personhood. In this conception of property as fleeting, indeed fugitive, American law preserved for much of the rest of the century slavery's most pressing legal imperative: the production of personhood as a market commodity. By revealing the paradoxes of this relationship between fugitive slave law and intellectual property law, Best helps us to understand how race achieved much of its force in the American cultural imagination. A work of ambitious scope and compelling cross-connections, "The Fugitive's Properties" sets new agendas for scholars of American literature and legal culture."
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Details
- Bookseller
- Palimpsest Scholarly Books
(US)
- Bookseller's Inventory #
- 1393
- Title
- The Fugitive's Properties: Law and the Poetics of Possession
- Author
- Stephen M. Best
- Book Condition
- New
- Quantity Available
- 1
- Binding
- Paperback
- ISBN 10
- 0226044343
- ISBN 13
- 9780226044347
- Publisher
- The University of Chicago Press
- Place of Publication
- Chicago
- Date Published
- 2004
- Keywords
- African-American History/Culture
Terms of Sale
Palimpsest Scholarly Books
30 day return guarantee, with full refund including original shipping costs for up to 30 days after delivery if an item arrives misdescribed or damaged. Packages are shipped USPS. New York state purchases will also be charged state tax.
About the Seller
Palimpsest Scholarly Books
Biblio member since 2017
Brooktondale, New York
About Palimpsest Scholarly Books
Palimpsest Scholarly Books & Services is a new online bookstore founded and managed by Dr. Raul Delgado-Rodriguez, a Harvard-trained comparatist. It specializes in the buying and selling of scholarly and rare books, as well as providing services for collectors of such books, including the appraisal of private collections. We have titles across a broad range of fields and cultures. We specialize in providing uncommon foreign-language works.
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- New
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