Slate Academy: The History of American Slavery

In Episode 9, the finale episode of our inaugural, members-only Slate Academy, the History of American Slavery, hosts Rebecca Onion and Jamelle Bouie discuss emancipation. They examine how emancipation was more a process than an overnight change, and they compare the different ways it was enacted in the South and throughout the United States. They also discuss how people sought to rebuild their lives and reunite their families once they had achieved freedom from slavery. They begin the episode by remembering the life of Rose Herera (1835–unknown). Our guests in Episode 9: Adam Rothman is associate professor of history at Georgetown University. Read an excerpt from Rothman’s book, Beyond Freedom’s Reach: A Kidnapping in the Twilight of Slavery. Heather Andrea Williams is the presidential professor and professor of Africana studies at the University of Pennsylvania. Read an excerpt from Williams’ book, Help Me to Find My People: The African American Search for Family Lost in Slavery. You can email us at historyacademy@slate.com. And you can continue to talk to other Slate Academy classmates in our members-only Facebook group.

“How do we get Americans to talk honestly about slavery?” That question was the subject of a sold-out Sept. 17, 2015 symposium organized by Slate and George Washington University. It was a capstone event for the History of American Slavery, the inaugural Slate Academy hosted by history writer Rebecca Onion and chief political correspondent Jamelle Bouie. Featured speakers: - Jamelle Bouie, chief political correspondent, Slate.com - Rebecca Onion, history writer, Slate.com - LeVar Burton, actor, director, educator. (Transcript of Jamelle and LeVar's conversation.) - Nancy Bercaw, Mary Elliott, and Paul Gardullo, Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture - Jennifer James, director of the Africana Studies Program, GWU = Joseph McGill, director, The Slave Dwelling Project - Dolen Perkins-Valdez, author of Balm and Wench - Michael W. Twitty, chef and blogger, Afroculinaria - Kamau Sadiki, vice president, National Association of Black Scuba Divers Access all Academy content at Slate.com/Academy

In Episode 8 of The History of American Slavery, a Slate Academy, hosts Rebecca Onion and Jamelle Bouie discuss the small minority of people who escaped slavery during the 1850s and 1860s and the people who helped them along the way. They examine our evolving and sometimes selective historical memory of the Underground Railroad. They also explore the legal environment that confronted fugitives and their helpers and how it changed after the passage of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850. Jamelle and Rebecca begin the episode by looking at the life of John Parker (1827–1900). Our guests in Episode 8: Steven Lubet is Williams memorial professor of law and director of the Bartlit Center for Trial Strategy at Northwestern University School of Law. Read an excerpt from Lubet’s book, Fugitive Justice: Runaways, Rescuers, and Slavery on Trial. Eric Foner is DeWitt Clinton professor of history at Columbia University. Read an excerpt from Foner’s book, Gateway to Freedom: The Hidden History of the Underground Railroad. Access all features of the Slate Academy at Slate.com/Academy. Next time, on Episode 9 of The History of American Slavery, Jamelle and Rebecca remember the life of Rose Herrera (1835–Unknown). They’ll talk to Heather Williams and Adam Rothman about the journey of emancipation and the many ways enslaved Americans had to grab freedom during the war. Your homework, should you choose to accept it: Read an excerpt from Rothman’s book, Beyond Freedom’s Reach: A Kidnapping in the Twilight of Slavery. You can email us at historyacademy@slate.com. And you can talk to other Academy classmates in our members-only Facebook group. Follow-Up on Episode 7: In Episode 7, Rebecca implied that Samuel Cartwright didn’t support the theory of polygenesis. In fact, Cartwright did eventually espouse the theory in the later years of his career. We also wanted to link to a scholarship fund that we discovered after production of the podcast: the Anarcha, Betsy, and Lucy Memorial Scholarship Award is administered by National Medical Fellowships and awarded to female medical students who are descendants of American slaves.

In Episode 7 of the History of American Slavery, a Slate Academy, hosts Rebecca Onion and Jamelle Bouie explore what modern medicine gained from slavery, and how slaveholders sought to legitimize their their ideology through science. They discuss how doctors such as J. Marion Sims used human experimentation on enslaved subjects to help advance the practice of medicine. And they explore how scientific racism, as practiced by doctors such as Samuel Cartwright, was used to justify slaveholder practices. Jamelle and Rebecca begin their discussion by looking at the life of Anarcha (1828?-unknown), an enslaved women who endured more than 34 experimental surgeries that culminated in a path-breaking medical discovery. Our guests in Episode 7: Deirdre Cooper Owens, an assistant professor of history at Queens College, CUNY, and author of the forthcoming book, Mothers of Gynecology: Slavery, Immigration, and the Birth of American Gynecology. Christopher Willoughby, a Tulane University graduate student at work on a thesis that’s tentatively titled, “Pedagogies of the Black Body: Race and Medical Education in the Antebellum United States.” Access all features of the Slate Academy at Slate.com/Academy. Next time, on Episode 8 of the History of American Slavery, Jamelle and Rebecca remember the life of John Parker (1827–1900). They’ll talk to Eric Foner and Steven Lubet about fugitives and the Underground Railroad. Your homework, should you choose to accept it: Read an excerpt from Foner’s book, Gateway to Freedom. You can email us at historyacademy@slate.com. And you can talk to other Slate Academy classmates in our members-only Facebook group.

In Episode 6 of The History of American Slavery, a Slate Academy, hosts Rebecca Onion and Jamelle Bouie explore the rise of the antebellum cotton economy in the early decades of the 19th century. They discuss how the growth of the cotton industry transformed the American system of slavery and the lives of enslaved people. And they discuss slavery’s relationship with the development of modern American capitalism. They begin the episode by discussing the life of Charles Ball, who wrote about his experience working on a cotton plantation in his autobiography, Slavery in the United States: A Narrative of the Life and Adventures of Charles Ball. Our guests in Episode 6: Edward Baptist, associate professor of history at Cornell University. Read an excerpt of Baptist’s book The Half Has Never Been Told: Slavery and the Making of American Capitalism. Daina Ramey Berry, associate professor of history at the University of Texas at Austin. Read an essay by Berry about how enslaved persons understood their valuation as commodities. Here are some of the links discussed in Episode 6: - Watch Key and Peele’s entire take on slave auctions. - Elsewhere in the Slate Academy, a detailed brochure from an 1855 slave auction. Access all features of the Slate Academy at Slate.com/Academy. Next time, on Episode 7 of The History of American Slavery, Jamelle and Rebecca remember the life of Anarcha (1828?–unknown). They’ll talk to Deirdre Cooper-Owens and Christopher Willoughby about the disturbing relationship between slavery and 19th-century science and medicine. Your homework, should you choose to except it: Read this essay by Marie Jenkins Schwartz to learn more about how antebellum enslavers sought to control the sexual health of enslaved women. You can email us at historyacademy@slate.com. And you can talk to other Academy classmates in our members-only Facebook group.