October 05, 2009
Slavery in America – Online Resources
By Elisabeth Grant
The University Libraries of the University of North Carolina at Greensboro (UNCG) recently announced the launch of its new online Digital Library on American Slavery, “a searchable database of detailed personal information about slaves, slaveholders, and free people of color.” Visitors of the site can search by name, by subject (including topics like “slaves and slave management,” “attaining freedom,” and “free people of color”), and by petition, which draws from southern county court and legislative petitions spanning the years of 1775 through 1867.
This new resource has the potential to be of great use to researchers, and inspired us to bring you a roundup of some other slavery resources covered previously on the blog and in the pages of Perspectives on History. Continue below for links to these resources and short descriptions of each.
Sites
For use by historians, history educators, students, and the general public, these sites offer resources for those conducting scholarly research to those who are just curious about this page in history.
- Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database
Covered a year ago on AHA Today, the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database contains information on nearly 35,000 slave voyages. - Texas Slavery Project
Examining slavery in Texas between 1837 and 1845, this project offers a population database, maps, search engines, and a list of primary sources. - African Americans and the End of Slavery in Massachusetts
Explore slavery in Massachusetts with the Massachusetts Historical Society’s presentation of historical manuscripts and documents. - Documenting the American South
This site, from the University Library at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, houses the “single largest collection of slave narratives in the world.”
Lesson Plans
The following sites may be of particular interest to K-12 history teachers who are looking for lesson plans and resources for the classroom.
- EDSITEment
EDSITEment, from the NEH, continues to offer a massive amount of high quality teaching resources. Check out the lesson plans in the U.S. History – African-American and U.S. History – Civil War and Reconstruction categories, and use the search function to find an even wider variety of resources. - White into Black: Seeing Race, Slavery, and Anti-Slavery in Antebellum America
The “White into Black” lesson plan comes from the Picturing U.S. History site, offers a “Lesson in Looking” that focuses on “how visual media shaped and were shaped by beliefs about slavery, race, and equality during the two decades preceding the Civil War.” - National History Education Clearinghouse
Search through the National History Education Clearinghouse for slavery related resources.
Articles
You may also be interested in reading articles on the topic of slavery from major newspapers and Perspectives on History.
- Newspapers
- Madison and the White House, Through the Memoir of a Slave (NYT, August 2009)
- College Park’s Links To Slavery on Syllabus (Washington Post, February 2008)
- Perspectives on History
- Slavery-Era Disclosure and Atlantic Commerce (October 2008)
- Natalie Zemon Davis’s Slaves on Screen: A Review Forum (September 2001)
- Introduction by Vanessa Schwartz
- "A Fine New Book" by Adam Rothman
- "Let Films be Films" by Ginette Vincendeau
- The Author’s Response by Natalie Zemon Davis
- Africans in America: America’s Journey through Slavery: A Review (April 1999)
- Interpreting Slavery in the Classroom and at Historic Sites (March 1998)
- Slavery and the Freeing of American History Instruction (April 1995)
Great listing; here’s one more:
The Revised Dred Scott Case Collection
http://digital.wustl.edu/d/dre/index.html
“This collection is an expanded and updated version of the original Dred Scott Case Collection. The collection, was expanded from eighty-five to one hundred and eleven documents, over 400 pages of text. In addition, the collection is now a full-text, searchable resource that represents the full case history of the Dred Scott Case.”
— Kelly Woestman Oct 7, 10:11 AM
For anyone interested in the bigger picture, here is a very educational and enlightening article:
The Scourge of Slavery
— Jeff Jenkins Oct 22, 03:04 PM