HIST 501: Enslaved Perspectives in US History

Slavery from the Enslaved’s Point-of-View,

History 501, “Slavery from the Enslaved’s Point-of-View,” is open to advanced undergraduate and graduate students in History and other departments. This course’s goals include fostering the ability to think, write, and reason historically.  It teaches not the conclusions of historians but historical methods. In particular it encourages students to think carefully about primary documents (sources from the period) and to consider what they tell us about slavery.  Some small reading of historians will also be undertaken.  A basic mastery of facts about slavery will be developed, but the emphasis will be on your ability to interpret, reason, and communicate, orally and in writing.  We will often work in small groups or in other collaborative ways, as historians do at their best.  We will see how historians respectfully argue with each other. In the seminar, good listening, building on (or challenging) other students’ remarks, recalling points from other readings or other class sessions, bringing up insights drawn from other classes, willingness to take intellectual chances, and ability to specify just what particular evidence best makes your point will be prized. Many of those skills will also find their way into the series of short papers, the longer paper, and the book review that you write. In addition to the 2.5 hours of seminar each week plan on five hours of work outside of class with readings relatively light and the amount of writing moderate.

            Intellectually we will be exploring the possibilities of doing what an older generation of scholars called “history-from-the-bottom-up,” while recognizing that the sources for doing so are often few and problematic. Indeed we will start with and frequently return to the words of the formerly enslaved novelist, essayist, and freedom fighter William Wells Brown, who wrote in 1847 that “Slavery has never been represented; slavery can never be represented,” even as he sought to represent, and to abolish, slavery.  Among the vital questions we will pursue—still others will emerge from discussion—are: How, during and after the slave trade, did many African groups become an African American people? Is the history of slavery best written by putting the relationships of masters (and mistresses) with enslaved people at the center or by putting the relationships of the enslaved to each other there? What were the forms of resistance to slavery? Should historians emphasize the brutality of the system or the resistance, dignity and community-building by slaves?