By Isabelle Laskaris On October 4th 1743, Stephen Gardiner wrote to the Justice of the Peace in New London, Connecticut, to complain that four of his slaves and servants had deserted his service the night before. He described them as Cesar, a mulatto man servant, Ann, a Spanish Indian Squaw, Ann an Indian girl, and Phillis, an Indian girl. Only a few days later, a … Continue reading Seeking freedom from slavery: settling Native American ancestry in colonial Connecticut

By Dr. Niels Eichorn On June 9, 1853 the Irish firebrand and 1848 revolutionary, John Mitchel rode into Bothwell, Tasmania, where he walked into the police station. The British authorities had convicted Mitchel and a number of other Irish revolutionaries to transportation. Instead of incarceration, Mitchel had promised to not escape and received a limited freedom of movement. Once inside the police station, Mitchel returned … Continue reading Transatlantic Separatist Migration and the War of the Rebellion

By Dr. Ross A. Brooks My older brother brought the American Civil War into my outer suburban Melbourne world. It came in the form of “The How and Why Wonder Book of the Civil War.” I was perhaps eight and he returned home with it as spoils from a trip to the city with my grandmother. It was new, it was attractive, and I took … Continue reading The Visible Confederacy

By Dr Lindsay Rae Privette, I spent seven years working as a summer seasonal at Vicksburg National Military Park. It was a natural fit. I was born and raised in Vicksburg, Mississippi, the battlefield had been a staple of my childhood, and I knew its story by heart. Dubbed the “Gibraltar of the Confederacy,” Vicksburg was the last Confederate stronghold on the Mississippi River by … Continue reading Invaders in a Foreign Land: Nature, Climate, and the Vicksburg Campaign

By Matthew Thorne It was the month of December and London was calling for the British Association for American Studies Postgraduate Conference. The event was held on hallowed ground for academics and sight-seers alike; the British Library, hosted within the Eccles Centre for American Studies. Try as one might, it is difficult to imagine a better venue for a conference on American Studies in the … Continue reading Conference Review: BAAS Postgraduate Conference, December 2019

By Dr Georgiana Banita     Ever since my first engagement with the traumatic relation between race and policing (the conference, Black America and the Police in 2016), I have sought to trace what I consider to be the guiding principle of repressive state action against communities of color: the anticipation of black violence. This period has also overlapped with technology advancements in digitally-driven predictive … Continue reading Models of Black Motion: On the Predictive Policing of Race

By Associate Professor Jessica Kim   Much of Donald Trump’s campaign rhetoric and policy proposals focus on the closure of borders, the building of walls, and limiting the flow of goods and people across international boundaries. This inflammatory speech belies the deep historical connectedness of the U.S.-Mexico borderlands, from migration and employment patterns, to the flow of trade goods and services, to the existence of … Continue reading Roads and Walls in the U.S.-Mexico Borderlands