Slave Life in Documents: Edgefield's Enslaved Laborers

Slave Life in Documents: Primary Sources regarding Edgefield's Enslaved Laborers with Dr. Maggi Morehouse

Where are the records located and how can they be utilized to give meaning to African Diaspora life in the Edgefield District? 

What methodological issues do researchers face when attempting to craft the historical narrative?

How does the researcher go back in time and utilize records that occluded ordinary voices?

What sorts of non-exploitative techniques can the present day researcher employ in regards to creating an empathetic and “true” historical narrative?

Join Dr. Maggi M. Morehouse for a discussion on uncovering primary sources that reveal the interior lives of enslaved people, specifically highlighting data from Edgefield, SC, laborers. Questions of access and understanding will be explored through examples from her African Diaspora fieldwork. In addition, the archeological excavation under way in Edgefield is revealing material artifacts about the community of potters who labored in the area. Archival data, particularly oral histories, reveal a more nuanced and complicated story, and Morehouse will highlight how to collect and analyze all of the sources for the most thorough understanding.

Dr. Morehouse is the first graduate of the African Diaspora Studies program at the University of California Berkeley, completing her Ph.D. in May 2001. Today, she teaches Southern History at Coastal Carolina University, with a focus on connecting the American South to global diasporas and migrations. She has been working with media providing historical consultation and crafting oral histories into visual short stories on topics ranging from enslaved potters, to southern women, to African Diaspora migration. She is a board member of the statewide NEH program, the SC Humanities Council.