This course explores the institution of slavery in the antebellum US South. Focusing on the lives of both enslaved people and white enslavers, it considers how gender shaped the everyday experiences of those who were at the centre of the institution of slavery, including their work, family lives, experiences of violence, their emotions and forms of resistance. When trying to understand the lives of enslaved people, the archive is plagued with silences – we often only know fragments of information about the enslaved people we encounter within historical documents. So the course begins with an exploration of recent literature, pioneered by Black feminist scholars, about the way in which power enters the archive, and the creative methods that historians use to grapple with archival absences.
Applying these methods, we then move to consider the lives of the enslaved. Exploring themes such as gendered labour and sexual violence, the course examines the everyday violence that enslaved people had to navigate, as well as their many forms of resistance to the institution of slavery and refusal of the term of their bondage.
We will also explore the ideologies and beliefs that shaped the actions of slaveholding men and women, and the emotional lives of enslaved people. Finally, as the Civil War approached, enslavers and enslaved people’s lives changed drastically, and we conclude by considering the experiences of enslaved men and women during this time.
