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Marking Stories of Slavery
Stephen Hanna, University of Mary Washington
Plantations in America’s South are physical testaments to the great wealth accrued through slave labor. Yet plantation museums often gloss over that economic history in favor of more romanticized depictions of plantation life.
Teaching Slavery and Emancipation
Gabriel Reich, Virginia Commonwealth University
There’s little historical evidence that African Americans supported the Confederate cause by becoming soldiers. Yet this myth of the “black Confederate” remains in circulation. Reich studies the way collective memories of the Civil War are shaped and offers ways school curricula could address these problematic narratives.
Jesse James: the myth and the reality
Cathy Jackson, Norfolk State University
Jesse James was a thief and a cold-blooded killer who gunned down unarmed civilians. So why did newspapers at that time portray him as a folk hero? We take a look at the myth and the reality of one of America’s most notorious outlaws.
The Civil War through Dreams
Jonathan White, Christopher Newport University
Mom’s home cooking, wives’ infidelities, and slaves dining with white families—White says you can write a whole history of the Civil War through the dreams of people who lived through it.
In this hour we look at how slavery is represented in the classroom and on historic sites.
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That was fascinating, I enjoyed all three sections.
Thank you for the positive feedback, Eva!
Thank you for providing another layer of scholarship for my lesson planning.
Thank you for listening, Valencia! We’re glad this is helpful in your lesson planning.
This is one of the many reasons why I am an avid public radio listener. The history of slavery has been swept under the rug and at the same time, there is a persistent demonization of minorities through limitations to the poor who are deemed lazy for being on welfare for several generations. I find it humorous that many of the beneficiaries of slavery have not expressed any desire in righting this terrible wrong!