Stephanie Camp\u2019s work in Closer to Freedom<\/em> is important and unique, because in a field of slave narratives largely aimed solely at eliciting sympathy and horror (Camp notes the prevalence of this leading up to the civil war, citing Theodore Weld and Angelina Grimke\u2019s American Slavery As It Is<\/em>, but I would argue it remains prevalent today). Unlike authors and historians who wish to either atone for wrongs or induce guilt, Camp appears to have a simple goal: to restore agency to a people who for so long have been robbed of it in the historical narrative.<\/p>\n

Andrew points out in his response that Camp shies away from using the word \u201cslave,\u201d preferring the terms enslaved people or bondsmen\/women because those terms grant more agency than the static idea of a slave. This is a very deliberate choice Camp makes, and she clearly explains in a footnote to the introduction that the term slave \u201crisks flattening the complex history of slavery and essentializing the personhood of bondspeople\u201d (143). In this way Camp perceives an important point that lends credibility to her entire goal \u2013 it would be quite difficult to demonstrate the agency of a marginalized population while using the language of their oppressors; a word that connotes complete lack of freedom.<\/p>\n

Camp\u2019s decision to focus on women is also unique, and serves as an effort to fill in some of the gaps in the historiography of American slavery. I will freely admit that I am no expert in this field, but the books I have read (and even the movies I have seen) tend to largely, if not completely, focus on the experience of enslaved men. Camp\u2019s work led me to realize that this imbalance likely stemmed from the fact that men were much more frequently able to successfully and permanently escape. Women, hampered by more familial and social responsibility than men, made do with smaller bursts of resistance through absenteeism and secret gatherings (37). She even notes at several points that even this seemingly small form of resistance proved quite dangerous for women in particular, because they were rarely granted passes to move outside the plantation boundaries (72).<\/p>\n

A particularly interesting section of the book, especially in regards to women, is the discussion of slaveholding women and their treatment of enslaved people. Camp asserts that slaveholding women were more violent and impulsive than male slaveholders and overseers, due to the strange idea that \u201ctrue manly mastery exhibited control, not passion; honor was not satisfied by the meting out of vindictive beatings to social inferiors\u201d (132). This idea does make sense, but I think it is interesting to point out that this idea of mastery through levelheaded control is almost completely discredited in any popular media portrayal of slaveholders, in favor of “masters” who seem irrational and governed by strong emotions. If this was indeed the disposition of most male slaveholders, why is there such a disconnect between history and popular culture?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Stephanie Camp\u2019s work in Closer to Freedom is important and unique, because in a field of slave narratives largely aimed solely at eliciting sympathy and horror (Camp notes the prevalence of this leading up to the civil war, citing Theodore Weld and Angelina Grimke\u2019s American Slavery As It Is, but I would argue it remains […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":34,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-239","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.shroutdocs.org\/hist571-fall2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/239","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.shroutdocs.org\/hist571-fall2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.shroutdocs.org\/hist571-fall2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.shroutdocs.org\/hist571-fall2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/34"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.shroutdocs.org\/hist571-fall2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=239"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/courses.shroutdocs.org\/hist571-fall2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/239\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":240,"href":"https:\/\/courses.shroutdocs.org\/hist571-fall2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/239\/revisions\/240"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.shroutdocs.org\/hist571-fall2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=239"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.shroutdocs.org\/hist571-fall2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=239"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.shroutdocs.org\/hist571-fall2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=239"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}