Black Women and the New Birth of Freedom

The African-American freedom struggle has been led in many cases by women, although their contributions are only beginning to be recognized. This talk explores how the Civil War and Reconstruction transformed three Black women from college students into civil rights activists. Edmonia Lewis, Blanche Harris, and Sara Stanley were educated in Christian theology and cognizant of the prejudices arrayed against their race and gender. Thus, they couched their advocacy for racial justice in human terms, asserting that dignity was the birthright of all children of God. Their argument that equal humanity entitled African Americans to equal rights and full respect helped lay the foundation for the modern Civil Rights and Black Lives Matter movements.

John Frederick Bell, Ph.D., assistant professor of history at Assumption, is a historian of race, education, and American social reform. Prior to starting at Assumption in 2019, he was a Spencer Dissertation Fellow at the National Academy of Education, a Kilachand Postdoctoral Fellow at Boston University, and a visiting lecturer at Brown University. He received his master’s degree in history and Ph.D. in American studies from Harvard University. Prior to graduate school, he worked as a declassification analyst at the National Archives and as a high school social studies teacher in rural North Carolina. His research has appeared in History of Education Quarterly, Journal of the Civil War Era, and Journal of the Early Republic. His first book, Degrees of Equality: Abolitionist Colleges and the Politics of Race, will be published this spring by Louisiana State University Press.

This lecture is sponsored by the Office of the Provost, the Women’s Studies Program, and the Cross-Cultural Center. 

For Zoom invite, email cpicasmith@assumption.edu.