Monday, June 28, 2004

• Interracial couplings in turn-of-the-century New Orleans
  CVK
  A new book, "The Great Southern Babylon," details the history of New Orleans' famous red-light district, Storyville, between 1865 and 1920. A Houston Chronicle review explains that the city was known as "the Sodom of the South" not only because prostitution was rampant, but because interracial couplings were so common:

  “The city, remote from the rest of the nation and exotically French, was storied for the prevalence of placage, the adoption by wealthy white males of mixed-race mistresses.

  
  Balls at which such liaisons were formed were must-see events for many 19th-century voyeur-visitors to the city. Titillating the tourists is a venerable Crescent City tradition.

  
  Long, a Louisiana State Museum historian, views concubinage — cohabiting without marriage — and prostitution through the prism of race. Storyville's primary sin, for many, wasn't simply the sale of sex but the carnal mingling of whites and people of color.”

  • 10:33 AM
  • 3 views
  • 0 eprops
  • 1 comment