Freedom, Colorism, and Race and Place in the American South

This unit focuses on a group of people in the American South who were for the most part free before Emancipation. They were not Native American. They were not Black. They were not White. They were an admixture of the three. Always pressing forward, they wanted their freedom to mean something other than they were not enslaved. Homer Plessy was a member of this group. So what did freedom mean for them in the eyes of the larger society in which they lived? And, how did they see themselves in the midst of the changing forces in the American South? Set against the back drop of slavery and racism in the Louisiana and Alabama, this work explores what their lives were like, legally and socially, and opens questions for further study. They are the Gens d’ Couleur.