David W. Blight

**Winner of the 2019 Pulitzer Prize in History** *Winner of the Bancroft, Parkman, Los Angeles Times (biography), Lincoln, Plutarch, and Christopher Awards* Named one of the Best Books of 2018 by The New York Times Book Review, The Wall Street Journal, The Boston Globe, The Chicago Tribune, The San Francisco Chronicle, and Time “Extraordinary…a great American biography” (The New Yorker) of the most important African-American of the nineteenth century: Frederick Douglass, the escaped slave who became the greatest orator of his day and one of the leading abolitionists and writers of the era. As a young man Frederick Douglass (1818–1895) escaped from slavery in Baltimore, Maryland. He was fortunate to have been taught to read by his slave owner mistress, and he would go on to become one of the major literary figures of his time. His very existence gave the lie to slave owners: with dignity and great intelligence he bore witness to the brutality of slavery. Initially mentored by William Lloyd Garrison, Douglass spoke widely, using his own story to condemn slavery. By the Civil War, Douglass had become the most famed and widely travelled orator in the nation. In his unique and eloquent voice, written and spoken, Douglass was a fierce critic of the United States as well as a radical patriot. After the war he sometimes argued politically with younger African Americans, but he never forsook either the Republican party or the cause of black civil and political rights. In this “cinematic and deeply engaging” (The New York Times Book Review) biography, David Blight has drawn on new information held in a private collection that few other historian have consulted, as well as recently discovered issues of Douglass’s newspapers. “Absorbing and even moving…a brilliant book that speaks to our own time as well as Douglass’s” (The Wall Street Journal), Blight’s biography tells the fascinating story of Douglass’s two marriages and his complex extended family. “David Blight has written the definitive biography of Frederick Douglass…a powerful portrait of one of the most important American voices of the nineteenth century” (The Boston Globe).

Prophet of Freedom

Frederick Douglass

Jim Downs

This collection of eleven original essays interrogates the concept of freedom and recenters our understanding of the process of emancipation. Who defined freedom, and what did freedom mean to nineteenth-century African Americans, both during and after slavery? Did freedom just mean the absence of constraint and a widening of personal choice, or did it extend to the ballot box, to education, to equality of opportunity? In examining such questions, rather than defining every aspect of postemancipation life as a new form of freedom, these essays develop the work of scholars who are looking at how belonging to an empowered government or community defines the outcome of emancipation. Some essays in this collection disrupt the traditional story and time-frame of emancipation. Others offer trenchant renderings of emancipation, with new interpretations of the language and politics of democracy. Still others sidestep academic conventions to speak personally about the politics of emancipation historiography, reconsidering how historians have used source material for understanding subjects such as violence and the suffering of refugee women and children. Together the essays show that the question of freedom—its contested meanings, its social relations, and its beneficiaries—remains central to understanding the complex historical process known as emancipation. Contributors: Justin Behrend, Gregory P. Downs, Jim Downs, Carole Emberton, Eric Foner, Thavolia Glymph, Chandra Manning, Kate Masur, Richard Newman, James Oakes, Susan O’Donovan, Hannah Rosen, Brenda E. Stevenson.

Disrupting the History of Emancipation

Beyond Freedom

the emancipation of John Washington and Wallace Turnage

A slave no more

the Civil War in the civil rights era

American oracle

In this sensitive intellectual biography David W. Blight undertakes the first systematic analysis of the impact of the Civil War on Frederick Douglass' life and thought, offering new insights into the meaning of the war in American history and in the Afro-American experience. Frederick Douglass' Civil War follows Douglass' intellectual and personal growth from the political crises of the 1850s through secession, war, black enlistment, emancipation, and Reconstruction. This book provides an engrossing story of Douglass' development of a social identity in relation to transforming events, and demonstrates that he saw the Civil War as the Second American Revolution, and himself as one of the founders of a new nation. Through Douglass' life, his voice, and his interpretations we see the Civil War era and its memory in a new light.

Keeping Faith in Jubilee

Frederick Douglass’ Civil War

A comprehensive look at how slavery and resistance to it have shaped Yale University Award-winning historian David W. Blight, with the Yale and Slavery Research Project, answers the call to investigate Yale University’s historical involvement with slavery, the slave trade, and abolition. This narrative history demonstrates the importance of slavery in the making of this renowned American institution of higher learning. Drawing on wide-ranging archival materials, Yale and Slavery extends from the century before the college’s founding in 1701 to the dedication of its Civil War memorial in 1915, while engaging with the legacies and remembrance of this complex story. The book brings into focus the enslaved and free Black people who have been part of Yale’s history from the beginning—but too often ignored in official accounts. These individuals and their descendants worked at Yale; petitioned and fought for freedom and dignity; built churches, schools, and antislavery organizations; and were among the first Black students to transform the university from the inside. Always alive to the surprises and ironies of the past, Yale and Slavery presents a richer and more complete history of Yale, the third-oldest college in the country, showing how pillars of American higher education, even in New England, emerged over time intertwined with the national and international history of racial slavery.

A History

Yale and Slavery

Jane Kamensky

Mary Beth Norton

Carol Sheriff

Howard Chudacoff

A PEOPLE AND A NATION is a best-selling text offering a spirited narrative that tells the stories of all people in the United States. The authors' attention to race and racial identity and their inclusion of everyday people and popular culture brings history to life, engaging readers and encouraging them to imagine what life was really like in the past. In the tenth edition, the number of chapters has been reduced from 33 to 29, making the text easier to assign in a typical semester. Important Notice: Media content referenced within the product description or the product text may not be available in the ebook version.

A People and a Nation: A History of the United States

The Brief Edition of A PEOPLE AND A NATION offers a succinct and spirited narrative that tells the stories of all people in the United States. The authors' attention to race and racial identity, and their inclusion of everyday people and popular culture brings history to life, engaging readers and encouraging them to imagine what life was really like in the past. In the tenth edition, the number of chapters has been reduced from 33 to 29, making the text easier to assign in a typical semester. Important Notice: Media content referenced within the product description or the product text may not be available in the ebook version.

A People and a Nation, Volume I: To 1877, Brief Edition

A People and a Nation, Volume I: to 1877

A PEOPLE AND A NATION is a best-selling text offering a spirited narrative that tells the stories of all people in the United States. The authors' attention to race and racial identity and their inclusion of everyday people and popular culture brings history to life, engaging readers and encouraging them to imagine what life was really like in the past. Available in the following split options: A PEOPLE AND A NATION, Ninth Edition (Chapters 1-33), ISBN: 978-0-495-91525-6; Volume I: To 1877 (Chapters 1-16), ISBN: 978-0-495-91589-8; Volume II: Since 1865 (Chapters 16-33), ISBN: 978-0-495-91590-4. Important Notice: Media content referenced within the product description or the product text may not be available in the ebook version.

A People and a Nation: A History of the United States, Volume II: Since 1865

Fredrik Logevall

A PEOPLE AND A NATION, 11th Edition, offers a lively narrative that tells the stories of the diverse peoples in the United States. The authors are prize-winning historians and experienced teachers who know how to explain historical change--whether race and gender, economics and public policy, family life, popular culture or international relations and warfare--in ways that students understand. The first textbook to focus on U.S. social history, the book also supports more specialized lectures through its attention to international history and the place of the U.S. in the world, politics and policy, social movements and economic issues. Available in the following split options: A PEOPLE AND A NATION, 11th Edition (Chapters 1-29), ISBN: 9781133312727; Volume I: To 1877 (Chapters 1-14), ISBN: 9781285430829; Volume II: Since 1865 (Chapters 14-29), ISBN: 9781285430836. Important Notice: Media content referenced within the product description or the product text may not be available in the ebook version.

A People and a Nation, Volume II: Since 1865

A People and a Nation: A History of the United States, Brief Edition

Follow history with a spirited narrative that tells the captivating stories of all people in the United States in Norton's best-selling A PEOPLE AND A NATION: A HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES, BRIEF EDITION, 11E. Written by award-winning historians and acclaimed authors, this revised edition clearly depicts historic change -- from race, gender, economics and public policy to family life, popular culture, social movements, international relations and warfare. The first book to focus on U.S. social history, this edition now emphasizes the place of the U.S. in international history and the world. Streamlined chapters, new learning features and more than 90 maps support learning, while a new digital version and optional MindTap and Infuse digital resources help you envision what life was like in the past. This edition is available as a complete edition or split editions: VOLUME I: TO 1877 (Chs. 1-14), and VOLUME II: SINCE 1865 (Chs. 14-29).

A History of the United States, Volume II: Since 1865, Brief Edition

A People and a Nation

Molly Rogers

M -- N -- O -- P -- R -- S -- T -- U -- V -- W -- Y -- Z

Race, Science, and Photography in Nineteenth-Century America

Delia's Tears

A People and a Nation, Volume II: Since 1865, Brief Edition

Gabor S. Boritt

Essays examine the causes of the Civil War, discussing pivotal events, people, and institutions

Why the Civil War Came

The newly discovered slave narratives of John Washington and Wallace Turnage—and their harrowing and empowering journey to emancipation. Slave narratives, among the most powerful records of our past, are extremely rare, with only fifty-five surviving post-Civil War. This book is a major new addition to this imperative part of American history—the firsthand accounts of two slaves, John Washington and Wallace Turnage, who through a combination of intelligence, daring, and sheer luck, reached the protection of the occupying Union troops and found emancipation. In A Slave No More, David W. Blight enriches the authentic narrative texts of these two young men using a wealth of genealogical information, handed down through family and friends. Blight has reconstructed their childhoods as sons of white slaveholders, their service as cooks and camp hands during the Civil War, and their struggle to stable lives among the black working class in the north, where they reunited their families. In the previously unpublished manuscripts of Turnage and Washington, we find history at its most intimate, portals that offer a startling new answer to the question of how four million people moved from slavery to liberty. Here are the untold stories of two extraordinary men whose stories, once thought lost, now take their place at the heart of the American experience—as Blight rightfully calls them, “heroes of a war within the war.” “These powerful memoirs reveal poignant, heroic, painful and inspiring lives.”—Publishers Weekly

Two Men Who Escaped to Freedom, Including Their Own Narratives of Emancipation

A Slave No More

Genevieve LeBaron

Jessica R. Pliley

Leading social scientists and historians debate key controversies in the field of modern slavery and human trafficking studies.

History and Contemporary Policy

Fighting Modern Slavery and Human Trafficking

David Blight takes his readers back to the Civil War’s centennial celebration to determine how Americans made sense of the suffering, loss, and liberation a century earlier. He shows how four of America’s most incisive writers—Robert Penn Warren, Bruce Catton, Edmund Wilson, and James Baldwin—explored the gulf between remembrance and reality.

David W. Blight

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