Baylor University Department of History and the Society for Historians of the Early American Republic (SHEAR) present a Black History Month 2021 Book Talk by Professor Kellie Carter Jackson on her new book Force & Freedom: Black Abolitionists and the Politics of Violence.

This even will be held on Tuesday, 23 February, from 3:30-4:30 CST, on Zoom.  Space is limited, so please click here to register.

In Force and Freedom, Kellie Carter Jackson provides the first historical analysis focused on the tactical use of violence among antebellum Black activists. Through rousing public speeches, the bourgeoning Black press, and the formation of militia groups, Black abolitionist leaders mobilized their communities, compelled national action, and drew international attention. Drawing on the precedent of the American and Haitian Revolution, African American abolitionists used violence as a political language and a means of provoking social change. Force and Freedom takes readers beyond the honorable politics of moral suasion and the romanticism of the Underground Railroad and into an exploration of the agonizing decisions, strategies, and actions of the Black abolitionists who instigated monumental social and political change.

Kellie Carter Jackson is the Knafel Assistant Professor of the Humanities in the Department of Africana Studies at Wellesley College. She is the author of Force & Freedom: Black Abolitionists and the Politics of Violence (UPenn Press, 2019). In 2019, Force and Freedom received the SHEAR Best First Book Prize and was a finalist for the for the 2020 Frederick Douglass Book Prize. Carter Jackson is also co-editor of Reconsidering Roots: Race, Politics, & Memory . Her essays have been featured in the Washington Post, The Atlantic, NPR, Transition Magazine, The Conversation, Black Perspectives , and Quartz.