Jessica Millward - Böcker

Finding Charity’s Folk highlights the experiences of enslaved Maryland women who negotiated for their own freedom, many of whom have been largely lost to historical records. Based on more than fifteen hundred manumission records and numerous manuscript documents from a diversity of archives, Jessica Millward skillfully brings together African American social and gender history to provide a new means of using biography as a historical genre.Millward opens with a striking discussion about how researching the life of a single enslaved woman, Charity Folks, transforms our understanding of slavery and freedom in Revolutionary America. For African American women such as Folks, freedom, like enslavement, was tied to a bondwoman’s reproductive capacities. Their offspring were used to perpetuate the slave economy. Finding loopholes in the law meant that enslaved women could give birth to and raise free children. For Millward, Folks demonstrates the fluidity of the boundaries between slavery and freedom, which was due largely to the gendered space occupied by enslaved women. The gendering of freedom influenced notions of liberty, equality, and race in what became the new nation and had profound implications for African American women’s future interactions with the state.

Finding Charity’s Folk highlights the experiences of enslaved Maryland women who negotiated for their own freedom, many of whom have been largely lost to historical records. Based on more than fifteen hundred manumission records and numerous manuscript documents from a diversity of archives, Jessica Millward skillfully brings together African American social and gender history to provide a new means of using biography as a historical genre.Millward opens with a striking discussion about how researching the life of a single enslaved woman, Charity Folks, transforms our understanding of slavery and freedom in Revolutionary America. For African American women such as Folks, freedom, like enslavement, was tied to a bondwoman’s reproductive capacities. Their offspring were used to perpetuate the slave economy. Finding loopholes in the law meant that enslaved women could give birth to and raise free children. For Millward, Folks demonstrates the fluidity of the boundaries between slavery and freedom, which was due largely to the gendered space occupied by enslaved women. The gendering of freedom influenced notions of liberty, equality, and race in what became the new nation and had profound implications for African American women’s future interactions with the state.

According to popular stereotype, Bravo reality television portrays vapid, one-dimensional characters tearing each other down for viewers' enjoyment. Whether The Real Housewives taps into our voyeuristic urges, our fascination with wealth and class, or the allure of the sheer spectacle of grown women yelling at one another, the show is truly a cultural phenomenon—and a global one, with more than twenty international spin-offs. Historians on Housewives looks past the show's reputation as lowbrow, unscripted reality television and unveils deeper historical meanings behind some of Bravo's best-known programs and franchises.This collection of ten essays is both a celebration of the bizarre behavior of the Real Housewives and a critical theorizing the importance of the shows and the Housewives themselves. Historians on Housewives explores relationships between historical topics and themes and some of Bravo's most iconic moments to demonstrate the usefulness of Bravo television as a tool for making history accessible. With contributions from scholars representing an impressive historical breadth, from the Roman Empire to the civil rights movement and beyond, the volume carves out a space for serious treatment of the franchise, fusing scholarship with pop culture to suggest interdisciplinary approaches for "doing history" that appeal to popular and academic audiences alike.Contributors are Nicole L. Anslover, Martina Baldwin, Emilie M.Brinkman, Marcia Chatelain, Jennifer C. Edwards, Jennifer M. Fogel, Tanisha C. Ford, Noah D. Guynn, Rosemarie Jones, Haley Schroer, Kristalyn M. Shefvelend, and Serenity Sutherland.

According to popular stereotype, Bravo reality television portrays vapid, one-dimensional characters tearing each other down for viewers' enjoyment. Whether The Real Housewives taps into our voyeuristic urges, our fascination with wealth and class, or the allure of the sheer spectacle of grown women yelling at one another, the show is truly a cultural phenomenon—and a global one, with more than twenty international spin-offs. Historians on Housewives looks past the show's reputation as lowbrow, unscripted reality television and unveils deeper historical meanings behind some of Bravo's best-known programs and franchises.This collection of ten essays is both a celebration of the bizarre behavior of the Real Housewives and a critical theorizing the importance of the shows and the Housewives themselves. Historians on Housewives explores relationships between historical topics and themes and some of Bravo's most iconic moments to demonstrate the usefulness of Bravo television as a tool for making history accessible. With contributions from scholars representing an impressive historical breadth, from the Roman Empire to the civil rights movement and beyond, the volume carves out a space for serious treatment of the franchise, fusing scholarship with pop culture to suggest interdisciplinary approaches for "doing history" that appeal to popular and academic audiences alike.Contributors are Nicole L. Anslover, Martina Baldwin, Emilie M.Brinkman, Marcia Chatelain, Jennifer C. Edwards, Jennifer M. Fogel, Tanisha C. Ford, Noah D. Guynn, Rosemarie Jones, Haley Schroer, Kristalyn M. Shefvelend, and Serenity Sutherland.