“With all the wrongs and neglects of her past, with all the weakness, the debasement, the moral thralldom of her present, the black woman of to-day stands mute and wondering at the Herculean task devolving upon her. But the cycles wait for her. No other hand can move the lever...
A biannual publication offering insights into the use of digital historical collections
Primary Sources in the Classroom
Early American Newspapers and the Adverts 250 Project: Integrating Primary Sources into the Undergraduate History Classroom
In January 2016 I launched the Adverts 250 Project, a daily blog that features an advertisement published 250 years ago along with analysis and historical context. This project grew out of my current research, a book tentatively titled Advertising in Early America: Marketing Media and Messages in the Eighteenth Century...
The Mysterious Mr. Carter: Transatlantic Adventures in Early American Finance
In August 1799, as partisan antagonism heated up in advance of the forthcoming U.S. presidential election, the Republican press worked hard to paint the Federalist establishment in the colors of an imperial court. Drawing comparisons with Caesar’s Rome, these newspapers pointed out that leading figures in the political and business...
Unlearning from Uncle Tom's Cabin in Black Literary Studies After Ferguson: Perspectives from a Graduate Seminar Utilizing Afro-Americana Imprints, 1535-1922
Most important, Stowe’s text allows whites to talk to other whites about the personal and national issues surrounding the slave [and current] black experience and establishes the character types usually associated with African Americans. Sophia Contave, “Who Gets to Create the Lasting Images?” During the very first session of my...
Antebellum Christian Tracts and the “Africanist Presence”: A Lesson Plan for African American Literature Courses
Introduction: “Christians, attend, while I relate…” [1] Legh Richmond’s The African Widow, a pamphlet circulated by the Christian-based American Tract Society in 1827, unwittingly displays a poignant example of the role Christianity has played in the creation and continuation of stereotypes of African Americans. The stereotypes invoked in the readable...
