Living in the Moment: Race, Gender, and How the Past Informs the Present...and Our Future, a College of Arts and Science Bentson Dean’s Lecture
The removal of Civil War monuments in places like Charlottesville and the aftermath of massive demonstrations by white supremacists, the sweeping rise of the #MeToo movement, and the ascent of a gender nonconforming teenager as one of the most vocal leaders in gun violence prevention are but a few ways our conversations about race and gender have been remarkably changed. What role should the histories of slavery or of Jim Crow have in our efforts to comprehend and respond to the current political climate? How should the afterlife of slavery inform our civic engagements? Jennifer Morgan considers the relationship between her work as an historian of African American women’s lives during and after slavery, and her engagement with contemporary social and political realities.
Jennifer L. Morgan, Professor of History and Chair of the Department of Social and Cultural Analysis at NYU, is the author of Laboring Women: Gender and Reproduction in the Making of New World Slavery (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2004), and the co-editor of Connexions: Histories of Race and Sex in America (University of Illinois Press, 2016). Her research examines the intersections of gender and race in the Black Atlantic world. In addition to her archival work as an historian, Morgan has published a range of essays on race, gender, and the process of “doing history.” Her current project considers colonial numeracy, racism, and the rise of the trans-Atlantic Slave Trade in the seventeenth-century English-Atlantic world.
All alumni and guests are invited to attend. No RSVP necessary.