Christian Schultz, Jr., Travels on an Inland Voyage Through the States, Volume II (New York, 1810), 197.
Item
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Title
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Christian Schultz, Jr., Travels on an Inland Voyage Through the States, Volume II (New York, 1810), 197.
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Includes music itself or text of song
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no
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Identity of singers; solo/group
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free?
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group
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Voice/instrument
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instruments
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drums
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Space/room
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unclear "in the rear of town"
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activity
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dancing
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Geographical location
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New Orleans, Louisiana
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Notable adjectives
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"wretched", "savage"
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Excerpt
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In the afternoon, a walk in the rear of the town will still more astonish their bewildered imaginations with the sight of twenty different dancing groups of the wretched Africans, collected together to perform their worship after the manner of their country. They have their own national music, consisting for the most part of a long kind of barrow drum of various sizes, from two to eight feet in length, three or four of which make a band. The principal dancers or leaders are dressed in a variety of wild and savage fashions, always ornamented with a number of the tails of the smaller wild beasts, and those who appeared most horrible always attracted to the largest circle of company. These amusements continue until sunset, when one or two of the city patrole show themselves with their cutlasses, and the crowds immediately disperse.
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Context
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Schultz describes his walk through the town and his encounter with free Black Americans dancing.
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Bias of author
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Bias presented in this text is about average for nineteenth-century sources written by learned, traveling white men.