Welcome to book people. We love being able to put on author events like this wind chill do over 300 a year and its because you keep coming back and support your local independent book stores so do that as much as you can. Tonight we have cameras. This is going to be filmed by cspan so that is exciting. Because of that, when we take question and answers, after she speaks, if you will please raise your hand with a question and wait until one of us comes around with the microphone. Everybody has exciting questions but give us a second and well get to you so we can hear you and not have to repea e pete questions. Repeat questions. Feel free to take pictures but dont have any flash on. We love to see your pictures. We have all the social media, we love to see your perspective. If you would right now please silence your cell phone so we dont have any interruptions. A lot of people have already bought bought the book. We have sold out but getting more in. If you purchase the book before you bring it up here to get signed wed love for you to do that. A far as the signing line, well line up and go in around the stairs, over to my right, where the kid section is and go around the staircase so we depth block the stairs and then the line win inhere. Youve want your become personalized well come around with sticky notes to put your name there. It works. So ill get that done. And so tonight, we are very, very excited to have daina ramey berry, with her book the price for their pound of flesh. So welcome. [applause] thank you so much for coming out. Wanted to thank book people and staff here for allowing me to do this reading here and also thank all of you for taking your friday evening and coming and joining us. I just wanted to structure this evening by reading a few passages from the book, talk about the process, reading a few more. So about maybe 20 minutes of reading total and then id like to open up the floor for question and answer from yall. If you have questions about the book or about the writing process or anything like that. So theres some sections and youll understand about the stuck tour once i get through some of this but ill begin with part of the introduction. Many a man 50 years old had not seep and felt what i had before my 20th year. These are the wofford jordan h. Banks was born into slavery, sold three times, escaped twice, and ultimately reached freedom. His early years were pleasant compared to those as he matured into adulthood. In this narrative published in 1861 we learn about the value of the enslaved and the we i trader and medical doctors trafficked humanle chatle from birth to death and beyond. Banks lived on a virginia plantation with his parents and 16 siblings. His mother was a cook and his father a headman. The family wanes tact. As young child he played with his enslavers son, alexander, who was just a year older than he. By age five, banks realwide that he and alex were different when his play midban began beating him. Banks fought back because his father warned him that had he not respond he would suffer the continued beatings. Embracing the spirit, banks tracked how many whippings he owed alex and returned them blow for blow. Even in childhood, banks actions showed an understanding of his soul value separate from his enslaver. As a processed the distinction between him and his nemesis he had another epiphany. Alec attended and cool he was sent to, quote, scarecrows scare crow thursday field himself dives boyhood began in fields. He his historian chain caught it tis quantum leap into the world of work. As they age in slave youth and young adults learn and understood their place in the world. Banks pa maturation solidified his forward offering enslavement. Especially during three pivotal events of youth and early adulthood. First wag the sale of his two sisters, the second the nearly fatal beating of his mother, and the third this slow death of his enslaver. Of the latter, banks remarked, i saw in life and in death but he left me in chains. Enslaved adults no very well that the death of their enslavers meant the breaking up of their families, thus when banks was put on the Auction Block in 1857 he had a message for his potential buyers. He spotted the traders and tried to liberate himself and run away. I gave them evidence they had a man to deal with, he says. And i determined now to let them see that they would have to treat me how they would have to treat me as a prisoner. During interviews with potential buyers, banks remain defiant by not revealing any information about hit health or his skills because he knew that it would affect the monetary value of him. Desspilt the efforts he called being purchased that day for 1,200. Skip over to another section. Enslaved pipe like banks recalled and respond to their monetary value is a primary thrust of this book. In particular, i examine enslaved and occasionally free blacks values and the individuals who had a vested interest in their fiscal vitality throughout thunder their lives and upon their death and after death. Their position shows just how how being treated as a commodity touched cheer birth, life, and afterlife. Thanks narrative described his experience as a fugitive in a kentucky prison. And his thoughts about death. Jailed in kentucky in october of 18 57 he was incourse rated for stenmonths and two days. The jail was, quote, more like place of punishment than a place of detention. Authorities spent much time trying to distract answers from the prisoners. Banks founded ironic that they jailers believe that the worst they were treated, the more likely that should tell where we came from. He and business fellow captives shared a coat of secrecy, vowing to, quote north tell their real name or place of abode. If i did we might just as well turn and go back home ourselves and save the masters the expense. Prison life was a trap just like slavery. During his anytime jail physicians came to treat the sick, and enslavers came in response to notices and two writes came when convict of murder and other crimes, while. While subjugated to this dual captivity an enslaved prisoner banks had an encount with a man who was assigned to share his cell. They man was near death. Banks was interested in him expanded to know hills story. The doctor who treated this sick cell mate developed a rapport we him and discovered he suffered from tuberculosis and needed care. Bank thought the sick man made a mistake by trusting the physician. The doctor described as very kind, found out where the man came from, as well as his name and enslaver. Promised the sick man he would perform him and car for him. Shortly after the enslaver came to jail to claim his property. The doctor informed him the sick man would not survive the journey back to his homestead, quote, but his reply was he did not care about the value of his life. Would rather take him dead as a caution to other slaves than not give him at all. Witnessing this exchange, banks observed this was a case that showed with what a spirit of revenge the owners pursue the slaves who escape. But with the malicious gratification of getting here is a map offered more than the poor skeleton of the slaves worth but the malicious gratification of getting him home dead or alive was so sweet the would not receive the price of his pound of flesh. With that, the sick man and his enslaver left, leaving a deep impression on banks understanding of himself as human property. The enslaver refused to sell a nearly dead man to a physician who was willing to pay for his pound of flesh, above the market value, preferring to make an example of him and assert that dead or alive he had use for the mans enslaved body. What was the physician lazy interest in man . Had he developed an affinity for him or have an ulterior motive . Doctors just like planters found ways to use enslaved bodies at all stages of health. They, too, had a price tag for the dead. Enslaved people represented an exchangeable commodity in thieves traders, enslavers and doctors. By exploiting love we find that the financial value of human chatle touch already chattel affect this life. Banks midthe phrase the price of his pound of flesh emphasized the only base of enslaved people. Their wareness and intellect have been present in historical record but few scholars asked what kid the enslaved think. Much of the existing literature is about what enslaved people experience but if we attempt to add their engamed understanding this engaged understanding this narrative changes. Enslaved people had different ideas. Looking at their view 0 commodity shifts we way look at slavery and added to the understanding of social and cultural systems that continue to devalue black lived today such as mass incarceration, elite athletes and performers. Part of a new economic history of american slavery, this book uses voice athletes traded and along with valuation of their captivity. Enslaved people speak back through the words and actions. They reach out from the pages and invite the reader to hear the stories to see them as human beings, and to understand them as commodities, just as they did. Enslaved people of all ages recognize the multi layered values ascribed to the bodies bs and their values were selfactualized. We begin this journey before conception, because even enslaved people had a monetary value. So ill skip forward at little bit more. Enslaved people were valued any life and death but because they were people in property multiple sets of values were placed on the bodies and now eyell define the way ive talk about value because im looking at both internal external values. I talk about the values share. Value is used here as a noun, a verb, and an adjective. It is passive, active, subjective, and reflective. It is rooted in kind itch valuing and requires an assessment of feelings. The first value signifies their spirit or soul value. It defied monetization and spoke to their spirit and soul as human beings. Threatened selfworth of enslaved people. For some then meant that no monetary value could allow them to comply with slavery. Others weakened by enslavement negotiated certain levels of commodity commodityic indication survived their experience and others were socially dead. While the value of the soul should not be located on the while the value of the soul should not be locate on a spectrum, this book assesses the living soul value, seeking to uncover what the enslaved actually made of this situation. They considered conceptions of selfand spaces that denied it. By centering their own thoughts and feelings as a oelseed to the flesh and blood values ascribed to their bodies, i demand recognition of the selfactualized value of their souls. The second form of valuation signifyies external value that planteres, doctors, traders and others attributed to enslaved people bases on potential work output. The third value also an external assessment represents the market value in terms of the sales price for the human flesh that negotiated in a competitive market. It often marked the highest price pate for them as commodities. Exploring these three forms of valuation at once, soul, xrays market, allow appraisal. Tut enslaved people had a fourth external value. One constricted at and beyond death. Ghost value is my concern for the price tag affectioned to deceased enslaved bodies and postmortems or as a circulated through what kale the domestic cadaver trade. Once unenslaved person died, whether buried or not that it were begin a goes value. Some were sold or transports for sale to medical schools throughout the United States. Ghost values were also assigned for legal and insurance purposes as indicated by state sponsored executions, court disputes and personal insurance policies. In other words, since enslaved peoples recall uwere calculated regularly its ease to determine the value of their body as death the ghost value. And an individual enslave keir look at his or her most recent inventory, insurance policy or bill of sale to find out how much one of his or her enslaved laborers was worth. Ghost values are evident in the probate records of plantation owners who braised the value of their labors in the last wills and test. Legal disputes over high are contract that result in load of enslaved life gave courts the right to value deceased chattel in order to settle cases. While not all dead people were sold, many were, as were free blacks and poor and marlingized whites. The enslaved body was also traded and sold and used after death. I want to pause here just for a moment to say thats the framing of the value system im trying to explore and i did about ten years of research through archives through the United States, both in the north and the south to come up with these values and to try to find the spaces where enslaved people talked about how they felt and how they what they believed in and about other forms of strength. I want to just Say Something now and read a small section on where i introduce soul value, again, i tried to trace the growth over time and initially if youre young, they dont necessarily know about the soul value built they became aware of us, the chapter on adolescence, between the average is ten 11 and 123, and this is therron starting to recognize theres soul value. The years were terrifying. Not only were their bodies changing, but this was also a time when enslaved children experienced the separation that they had feared all of their lives. Daughters and sons were taken from their parents as the external value of their bodies increased. Market scenes from their childhood now made sense and hanted them for the rest of their lives. At this station they knew full well that others planned ownership of them and Sexual Assault came at any age. However their parents, if present, as well as other kin, reminded them of a value that enslavers and traders do not commodityie identify. Their spiritual value, soul values often escaped calculation and developed during the years. Enriched through an inner spiritual centering that facilitated survival, soul view agod were reinforce bid loved ones. Sometimes the internal value appeared as a spirit, a voice, a vision, a premonition, a sermon or an ancestor or a god. Imcame in public and private set examination occasionally described as a personal message from a higher being where a heaviness in their soul in the core of their beings. My soul began singing, one person rid i was today i was one of the elected children. This telling, the uplifting, this singing singing singing ofl of Things Unknown thats me enslaved feel free during captivity. Freedom over the southerly matured in pubberty pewberty. Soul values were no a are, a it lated in the early teens. Reading the social and economic circumstances allows to us make educated conclusions regarding enslaved and adolescent internalize it soul value. Unlie appraisal and sale view us thats came from within. Such values sapped and defined enslaved peoples characters. From the time i was a little boy, Edward Walker related. I grounded my feelings to know i had to work for another man. These feelings were not encouraged by my parent reports the other slaves. Instead, they came from within me and grew with the years. As he aged, walker had the fortunate opportunity to learn to read and write and develop a big taste for math. He could up numbers like, must reply and died quickly and was good at divide quickly and was good at fractions. These skills, is inherent learning and believe in an incalculable soul value led to his successful escape. So, a number of places in the book i talk about running away, and i want to clarify that because im not suggesting that everybody made toy freedom. These are really exceptional cases. Theyre cases that made it to newspapers, that made it to archives, cases that made it into published narrative in books. So i cant say theyre representative. But it is a space where i can enter in and understand how enslaved people were feeling so i dont want to suggest that those that escaped has successful escape attempts but a lot of the ones i have in the book were successful in making it to canada. Now two other sections i want to read before i open it up to question and answer. One is my favorite story of the entire manuscript. Its a story of this gentleman named isaac. And this is from chapter five, and its the last chapter i wrote although the book has six chapters, the one that literally dish think i was an fire. Just came. It flowed in three hours. Ive never done. I gave it to my ed for my parents and friends and i asked people to read and it they would say we dont have any changes. Im like, come on have to have changes soole there was something about this, maybe because i had already framed the entire manuscript. This is longer section but i want you to know isaacs story and then wrap up with two quotes and then talk about the book. Isaac is an elderly enslaved man himself soul value and burial. When 40 plusyearold isaac took the stand people marveled over his muscular and active physique. South carolina residents saw him as quote, the very man of sculpture would select for a model. Because of the curves of his muscles and i the great strength he possessed. His intellect matched his physique and he was respected as much as unenslaved man could be in the institution that fought to destroy the spirit of such an individual. But isaac was different. He was richly gifted and with a clear headness and nobleness of will. His character garnered respect from enslaved and the free. Isaac was a leader. Like nat turner, danger field numberby, John Copeland and john brown hi tried to overturn the system of slavery decades earlier. When isaac took the stand he was not on the Auction Block. He was on the witness stand on trial for his life. Here isaac faced a jury not of heir peers but an elite group of enslavers. Men who questioned him about planning to lead a rebellion on july 4, 1816. That it aron yankee not an ironic dade. Dade. Eye sang had a sole value and this internal selfconstructed value manifest evidence itself as confidence, resolve, and belief in freedom. Those around him may not have rick nice it it because they were distracted by the value of his brawn. We learn of eye sick through the enemy rife witness to his trial. So this is just an example of my sours. The memory of a witness to his trial and executioner, a unanimous named john vaughn. Who shared the narrative. A kentucky newspapered for vaughn grew up in South Carolina and remembers id eye sass as hero. After being interrogated be conspiracy he and his cam rad planned for six months, eye sass walk found guilty along with 13 others and scheduled to hang as punish vaughn described isaac as head man who gained respect from his enslaver and he local minister before the Discovery Life his plan to rebel help was respectfully his community, respected that even, quote, the severest slave patrol would take his word and let million if he was ever caught without a written pass. When he planned the revolt veteran mar shred at hill physical prowess. His religious and the moral enemy strong that gave him pour over those around him. During the trial, isaac tried to take the blame and spire the lives his comrade improvement. I am the man, told to coward, without in the his addition. He spoke hesitation. Spoke with, courage and resolved. When asked be the plan he refused to testify againsts could only repeated, i am the man. Am the man and i am not a afraid or ashamed to confess it. Again, vaughn and others were stroked at his strength. But no ingenuity no promise no threat, could induce or force himself to reveal a single name in response isaac told theout have in the and no other you have me. No other no one other shall you get if i can prevent it. The only pain i feel is that my life alone is not to be taken. Then he apparently pointed to the other men on trial and state if these were safe, i shy die triumphantly. He is like selfless. Doesnt want them to be killed. When the court realized he would not implication any others they sent a minimum store isaac who now him to meet with him and hope to encourage him to conference. The course between isaac and his minister reveal isaacs soul view other. The two talked for four hours that night. When asked to share the details of the revolt isaac said, master, he began, will you, who first taught me religion, who made me know that jesus, that my jesus suffered and died in truth, will you tell me to betray the confidence, entrusted in me . And that sacrifice others lives because my life is to be forfeited . Clearly isaac had a sense of his obligation to his fellow men. He was aware of his actions would lead to his death but he valued the sacred confidence his comrades instilled in him. This is a model for his peers. He valued himself enough to sacrifice hi life and protect his fellow comrades. Isaac continued. Kuper suede me as a sufferer and strangler for freedom to turn traitor to the very men who were to help me . According to the minister, isaac spoke in a calm voice. With a nonthreatening demeanor and expressed, quote, greatness of soul. The minister could not proceed with questioning and acknowledged his own sense, stating that, quote, for the first time in my ministerial live i had done a mean base act, and felt myself to be the criminal. After a long silence the minister tried one more time to encourage isaac to consider the ramifications had he succeeded in lead rag rebellion him tried to get him to think about the bloodshed, the lives kloss whether or not he was capable of killings his enslaver and or his minister. To this isaac responded, i love old master and mrs. And you and yours. I would die to bless you anytime. But you taught me that god was a god of black as well as white, that he was no respecter of person. He reminded the minister of gods commandment in matthew 22, versus 36 through 40. Love the lord your gathered with all your heart ande all your mind. The first and the greatest commandment and the second i like if, Love Thy Neighbor as this. All the law and prophets hang once these. And thenned kitted minister about the souls and lives of the enslaved, sharing what was like to have a wife and children in bon bondage. Men of his race, quote, could make nothing. After the statement isaac shared he knew deep in his soul there was no help for his wife, his children, or his race, except if we were free. The minister listened and faced the hype pockcracy of this slaveholding brethren and their interpretation of gods chant end. Isaac said god called told me he could only help those who help themself sod isaac preached free dome to his fellow enslaved people because they had been betrayed. Then he looked directly into the clergymans face and says, i tell you now, if we had skeets succeeded i should have slain oldmaster and mrs. And you first to show my people that i could not dish could sacrifice my love is a ordered them to sacrifice their hate to have justice. After these chilling word head pointed to his shackled hand to his heart and said that god told him that he was right. For the second time during the conversation, the minister was overwhelmed and was ashamed of his conduct and humbled by isaacs worths. Im i. C. E. Sacks viewpoint was to command el he saw isaac as hero who conscious was unstrained by the crime. The minister ended the conversation with a prayer, holding isaacs hands while tears streams down his face. After they said amen and squeezed one anothers hanses they stood and isaac, too, was moved to tears. Master, i shall die in peace, he said. But through a strained voice and then asked the minister to lead his wife and children, quote, as you have led me to heaven. When isaacs death day came, it was a large crowd to witness his hanging. Just as they had on the same day that nat turner was hung and went to gallows. The buy standded wented to witness the execution of someone they considered a rebel. While isaac and six others stood on the platform we turned to them with the nice around his neck and says, be men and die like men. Then he asked them to watch his example and follow his brother residents lead after his death. His brother, too, stood on the platform that day and according to witnesses, ice isaac gates on the crowd. Some believed he was searching for his family. He said goodbye to his brother and other men but before the officer could pull the lever, isaac faced his brother and said, ill die a free man. He then sprung up as high as he could and fell heavily on the knotted rope which checked his fall. His body convulsed and his feet reached the plank. Eye sass jumped to his death on his own terms, not because the floor fell from under him. His brother witnessed this brave act and shouted, let us die like him. And the other six jumped to their deaths just as isaac had. Their bodies hung in air the usual time about 30 minutes before being cut down. Isaac and his brother and five others were given were then coffined and crated away to their burial place. We know that their bodies were laid to rest in an out of the way old field, but isaac and his comrades did not die in vain. They had a resting place, spot to mark their presence in the world, and a place to be remembered bit those who loved them. After their bodies were placed in ground, isaacs wife and children waited for the authorities to leave before approaching the grave of their beloved. No one but god knew how how long the widowed one and the fathers fatherless remained there but the morning morphing a rough stake was in the ground where isaac laid his wife placed a pile of stones with a memorial the head of his grave. The site was kept clean, weedfree and adorned with a wild rose until the day his wife joined him. So that is my isaac story. I want to say i think he real. Expresses what im trying to get out in terms of the soul value. Want to give time for q a but the other contribution i think the book dish hope the book has is a discussion of the domestic cadaver trade. And this is a trafficking of dead bodies. I traced medical school records, anatomy professors that were involved in this traffic, and they wrote letters back and forth to one another looking for the dead bodies of enslaved people or exhuming them from graves. One of pivotal quote is have is a quote from one medical doctor who the other that is saying, you know, tell me how much it costs for dead nword, one that you cant excuse medoor do tell at the kind of a dead stiff n, one that will cut of fat and doesnt smell Strong Enough to be nosed a mile off. Trails traffic and look the ways in which even after death, enslaved people were made commodities. So just two final closing short one sentence quotes, that kind of help me push through the book. And that is a quote from elizabeth keckle was the enslaved seamstress to marge that jeff sewn and she said autografted we shall be permitted to lay burdens down that a new world, world of brightness may open to us. The light that is denied is us here should glow beyond the dark mysterious shadow of death. In even another shared wrote a toe his wife on a jail wall. He says to her, dear wife, they cannot sell the rose of love that in my boosm, remember they cannot thy immortal part. Thank you. [applause] im happy to answer questions. We have 20 minutes. Since slavery was such a big business, have you found any textbooks or manuals or how to do books for slaves masters in not the lynch thing. And also, why have there been little or no known slave narratives out of the latin countries and the muslim world. Good question. We have some narratives from muslim slaves. They were veer views taken of those involved in the slave trade that had been traded into the slave trade, and both Michael Gomez writes best this. Silvan doof right about african muslims and antebellum america and they talk about the slave trade. We also have evidence of enslaved muslims and people who practice islam in coastal georgia and a number of narratives the a book and those people in that book were islamic enslaved people. So we do have that. Its just not as numerous. The larger collection of narratives we have comps from the Workers Progress Administration narrative taken in the 1930s, and those were interviews federal rally sanctioned and the wend around to different parts of the south and interviewed the last living descend accidents of slaves so tom descendents of slaves. They so i that are christian but we had some narratives of people in the islamic faith. To follow up his question, i dont know if you have ever heard of the nation of in brazil. To there was nation that lasted for eight or ten years the yes, the slave and was recognize and everything then the army went there the entire story. So, she is referring were there from south america, was a nation. The laed for hmm ten years and gentleman jamaica, a large, scale rebellion and had a treaty with the british to stay and live in isolation. She is referring to runaway slave communities where people escaped slavery and lived in isolation wimp he the same communities here and civil van wrote about this in the runaway slaves in the youd. Theres more work to be done particularly how we define these communities. Were looking at spaces that are like swamps with the space where enslaved people ran away and lived in isolation, we know theres caves and communes of forests, heavily weed areas where enslaved people lived in isolation and places off eye coatessal South Carolina and georgia where this occurred. So places where they escapedded and sneyd ice someplace were age to maintain life there for a number of years. Just not as much in the its as in south america and carribean. Thank you for this wonderful narrative. Great experience. You made a statement that the value the soul value can be expressed best to the who tried to run away. Can you elaborate on that . Is the implication that those only to the whose had a high soul value were the ones that tried to escape . No. No. Thats a good question. The round why i used those that ran away us because i had narratives from him that and they talk some of them made it to captained and one term they used when the put enslaved people in auction televize rate them like prime hand, full hand, a1, first rate and so one enslaved person who made it to canada said ill show you what first rate is. First rate is living in a house on my own, working my own plot 0 ground, planting my own seeds and living with my family. Thats first rate. And so that is just an expression to me. Soul value is when they cling ton ways to provide slavery but scholarship that we have in the 70s, showed africanamericans as overly victimized and they were victims. Dont get me wrong. But they never the didnt show as much about them fighting back and i thought to myself, how do you survive 244 yearses, several venations of individuals, making it out of slavery. Had to be something there, and i found it in these soul values. I know its great to be here. Ive really enjoyed your presentation. Is it that more literate slaves the ones who escaped . Im interested in the narrative and the journals. So obviously those are slave who had had some education and every attempt to not educate them. Right. I dont that i can say that. I dont know i can say some of these were just oral narratives somebody wrote for them and published them. So some of them signed with a mark, just an x. So that would indicate they were not all literate. But we just are fortunate to have those that survived, however they survived, whether they were working with an Abolitionist Group or published their narrative in a newspaper, whether they were recorded orally by wpa officer. So they werent necessarily i dont know theres a strong connection between literacy but i think if you can level to tell do live tell your story well have it. So the oral tradition is very rich here. The question, id like to know if you have a narrative im sorry the. Include a narrative from slaves who ran away to america to plantationser is, they been some debate where those folks who went to American Indian reservations American Indian lands or actually enslaved, too . Opened by American Indians and motion connection on the east african slave trade, and which was much longer and had more people die. And id like to remember kelly guyhouse, a book my face in black is true. Because she was imprisoned and the first leader of reparations movement. Exslave, trying to get money or slave people i tried to pull would not allow it bit i just feel its important they get her narrative out there too. Absolutely. Thats a book by mary francisber rhythm i didnt write about enslaved people in native american native because my graduate studenting doing a book on that. But just so without giving away to much of her study, they were owned native americans owned africanamericans so they were some enslaved bill enemy and policed in we are taken along the trail of tears and lived in communities as enslaved laborers so i decide not write about those individuals. She is writing about them and there are narratives about them as well. This is a twopart question. As is popular these days. Im wondering in your very search if you came across in any modern legal monetary valuations of peoples lives, like in wrongful deaths, how we value peoples live you said modern. Legal monitor do. You asking for modern. Yes. Yes. I cant remember the figure but i think while i was researching had a twoyear stint where iing would doing research in north carolina, and the their nance industry has to to Auto Industry has to value lives. I dont quote be but i feel like in the first part of Obamas Administration i think the value of a human beings life through Motor Vehicle accidents was Something Like 35 about 8 million and there was an natural New York Times and people wrote in saying im worth more that. If and so i think its interesting that you see that. People always ask me, did enslaved people have bragging rights, did they want have to eye value. They could care less. They wanted to remain with family members. Wanted to be where a loved one was traded to so they didnt care about in the numbers children body. They used that at a way to control or give themselves a space, some space to maneuver slavery. My second question thank you very movement. Really interesting. Is on a more personal level, how you worked with valuation in your life or people that you know to grow that . What do you mean . The internal soul valuation. I get it from these people in here. They give me strength. The stories in there. The fact that people survived. Also, just my own spiritual where i am spiritually and my belief system. The way my parents as raided me. Talk about net authors notes so i was given that in not everybody is our finds it but i feel fortunate to have found that. What personal of the abolitionists were slave owners . I dont know that statistic. They were they were, to, were the. Some of them were, yes. Im curious about what was there any general awareness of the posthumous medical slave trait trade at the time and any controversy in the areas where are abolitionism is would taking root . Yes. I only found one slave narrative that talked about it. Doesnt mean they didnt know about it because we saw evidence in some of the 19th Century Newspapers particularly emergency the Free Black Community who were afraid of the black body snatcher order medical doctors going and having their students exhume graves from people that had recently died supreme were studying obituaries and tried to find ways to lock cass scored have guards the burial grounds, but there was one slave narrative by a name named Charlie Grant who was asked to go by his owner, asked to go exhume the body of a twoyearold toddler and bring it to him to his office because the was going to ship it off to a dr. Johnson in virginia and so thats the only narrative i have and i knew from that narrative there was some knowledge of this. But most of the cases for me broke 1880s when the United States came up with anatomy acts, and because these grave robbers that been practicing this business for 30, 40, 50 years, were caught, and so thats when we then created this anatomy legislation. I was curious some other factors potentially maybe like the color of the slaves skin that might affect theyre value and we slaves have an innocent tonight hide incentive to make themselves appear less value. Ill answer the connect the quirts. Sometimes they did very drastic things to make themselves less valuable there is a story chapter three. Women in menstrual cycles some women one one plantation made sure they were not pregnant. Theyd had 15 or 20 a tennessee plantation, 15 or 20 women that war of child bearing age and the mast was surprise none were pregnant forker years on em. He captain say are you guys tampering yourselveses, creating doing something your bodies and they said no and vetter on they can foesed they had eaten cotton oil to make themselves miscarry. So thats one example. They did not want be to valued for their capacity to bear children. Another more extreme example, people damaging their bodies the auction. Chopping off hands, jumping out of window, trying to commit suicide, jumping over steamboats. While theyre being traded. Dont know how to swim, jump into a river. Those are ways they tried disrupt the sales and tried to devalue. Themselves the question of color is a question i get often. And i always sort of begin it by saying that our notions of colorism have changed and we are sort of stuck in this moment of the 1970s where people assume that the light skinnen slaved people were nor expensive than the dark christianed and house slaves were light skinned and that is not necessarily the case. There are fair skin enshriveled other. That were multivariable called fancy girls. That were tread as concubines and sex slaves. Multiracial and those women were pricees higher because of their looks according to peoples judgment, and they were not necessarily sold to work in labor in the houses and fields. They were sold for sex. Thats about the only place where i can definitely identify that. Id first like to thank you for the research and time you took to bring such things to revelation for the world. Not just for the community. So thank you. What is your hope for the book other than awareness . Uhhuh. Well, awareness is the first and primary. Also think theres a lot more research that needs to be done. I think this dish just touched the tip of the iceberg on this history, particularly the cadaver trades and i loan tech under part of it. Mapped out the trade between South Carolina, georgia, maine, but i skipped over new york, which i thick is probably a hub of this trade, and i skipped over the medical doctors in new york that i know were involved because i probably would have added another two years to process and it took ten years write the book. But i think thats part of it. But also for me i grew up being ashamed of slavery when i was a child, and i didnt dish dont want dish gained sentence and it people dont want to talk about slavery. Theyre kind of clam up because its a stain on our American History but there are beautiful stories within the institution of slavery. Beautiful people that were there. That found ways to have joy to have laughter to survive, and instead over having a extra in tim stigmatism ofle i want to have the stories of strength and resilience and survival, and thats my other hope for the book. Thank you. I want to go back to the discussion about the value and our people harming themselves to change their value. In a little different tint. Because being a woman i wonder about the fact that we could bear children and therefore increase the number of enslaved children so did that in any way affect our value compared to the males of our race . A lot of times we think about men being valued more but we have definitely from what you presented, a different value. So i was just wondering how that compared. Okay. Great question. I actually started when i was look to go actual numbers i have a database i use for the book of individual slave values. About 55,000 cases and i started off because i had eight plantations in georgia for my first book, where women were priced higher than men during the childbearing years and wanted know toe know it thats as national tread. Wellpregnant mothers more value because theyre repopulating the institution. It was not a national trend. Just unique to these particular plantations in one county in georgia, and i would argue thats patriots lib because they were a number of female slaves owners, that only the man additions, heir husband died so they were perhaps a little bit more sympathetic itch dont know. But these cases were the outliers, across the board women were priced lower than men. I after the hey average vallejo ours in the book and every category except for the fancy girlouts do find these other women and the fancy trade that were priced higher. Hello. Did you touch on the valuation of slaves who had a disability in this book . I somewhat did because i have graduate student from michigan stat that it rote a dessir saying on it and a book on that topic. Thats dismiss fog year is couldnt wait for snob do it. All my graduate class i would say that is Great Research area that no one has touched. So i didnt talk about its whole lot. In the book. But i well say this. They found ways to use every enslaved person, whether they were born with a congenital disability, whether they were given one from a court record, from the court sometimes the court disabled slave parts to the punishment, chopping off feet so they went return aim. What runway. My student found most of those with some form of disability had the institutional memory of of that Plantation Community because the often never left and if it were taken care of built the other members of the community. So thats a person that was often rarely sold. So they knew much more about that community about the owners, about the rhythm of life there because they were that constant figure just like the elderly were. So i mentioned the bream live but not a whole lot. I like to met my student does their thing. Not having read your book, wanted to know whether or not you look into the use of slavery or the institution of slavery as a Business Model and i give as an example the Jesuit Community that formed georgetown university. Not directly as a Business Model but i think a lot of the conclusions in chapter 6 in particular and chapter 4 where i talk about the medical schools and how they utilized not only the approached and slaved laub boyers to work as janitors in school and they medical doctors had shared like one seventh of unenslaved persons body so seven faculty members would buy a slave and they could sell their share irtheyve leftment but in georgetown case were now riley the beginning of uncovered some much more about how slave ray was part of a number institutionses, not just universities and plantations but municipal government, courthouses, you find enslaved labor in other public buildings and spaces as well. I think we have time for okay. I dont know where there you are. Thank you. Given the fact that a lot of the there was a lot of trade between the u. S. And england, during that particular time, and although abolitionists were centered the north there are businesses that supported the institution of slavery such as shipbuilders and clothing, all that was manufactured in the north and sent south. So the north was defer defer nitly complicit theres a scholar writing a book about it, be in clothing industry, clothing that enslaved people wore and the shoes they wore, were made in the north and sent down south. So theres a trade, the shipping, all that. My book focuses on the domestic slave trade, not the transatlantic. My question is a little bit on the more bid morbid side but you touch on cadavers cadavd doctors and interest in slave bodies. Were there explicit buyers of sick and dying slaves, and are there any significant medical contributions that you have discovered as a result of these . Great, great question. Pardon me . Significant. So, the first partoff temperature question is whether or not they were purchasing sick enslaved people. Yes, have advertisements that i write about in the book where theyre saying, were looking for people that have these conditions. And sometimes enslavers would sell them to medical schools because they wanted to study them and learn about different kinds of diseases. We also know that even nondiseased and enslaved bodied were experiment. On, fondled, people hear of sims who lodged at enslaved women and did surgeries for without using any anesthesia. So theres a history of using their bodies for that. In terms of discovery, i would say just its attributed in the records but theres this eye looking at an early peered on the eve of racial science, before embalming, before cremation, and the American Medical Association was founded during the period im writing. So you dont have organized systemic monday sin the way we do met medicine we do today and a lot of this is about curiosity and i find it eye ron yankee that during slavery, enslaved people were treated as not human or they were oar den know they know they were human being, i call them enshriveled people but once they caught them ohm medical doors and students learned that the inside of the human body was the same. So the only thing different was the skin on the outside. This bodies were the same on the inside. So a number of research they learn a lot about the human body during this time and they were using a number of africanamerican cadavers. You talked about the soul value and i imagine they rooted in christianity. Did you find any documents that the phrase had another fate that slaveholders didnt know they were practicing. I found soul values of lives. Believers would call that god or allah or another higher power. But some of them just said, i just knew in my soul. Didnt necessarily attribute it to a faith. So i dont say it necessarily had to do with some someone that believes in god. One more. This is making me think of the known world by mr. Jones. Edward jones. And wondering if in your research you came across freed slaves owning slaves as common place or rare or what . So the question is about black slaveholders essentially. They i didnt write about them here in this book. I studied William Johnson out of mississippi, because he is a black slave holder who had a journal. He was barber, and so he had a 800 pages of everything he did each day. But he didnt talk about enslaved people that much, couldso i didnt find that much evidence in his journal and i didnt read every page but a it wanted to talk about it, but theirs a look called black masters. Theres a book, black slaveholds so so some of owork had didnt done but i wanted to find more in the johnson narrative, that but i didnt find enough could i use to fit into the argument. It wasnt that common. Louisiana had a number of them. What ischial long being talk about black slaveholder you have to study them and understand the context. Some places like in the individuals that rockier and johnsonright write. In part of the deep and slower south, those black slaveholder were usually the saw tripping spring of their phoner own sore very fair skinned and tried to blend in and one way was to own slaves and treat slaves poorly. In virginia and other states, some blacks that were able to free themselves purchased their family members to live in pseudo slavery so they can live in freedom. So you have to study each case to understand the full story. Of those individuals. In the United States, now talking about shades of color like south america that people here will be blond white and still can be black. You know what i sunshine because there is this thing that you have a drop of whatever, that it happened. Why did it happen here and didnt happen in other. Why sneer. Yes. There whereas not a movement for reparations for what done to these people. You say why there is not. Yes. There is. Talking bat movement for rep operations for what happened with the germans. And this is much worse. There is a movement. Just depending on how you define success. Theres been bill in congress, there are people like an organization, up in 0 activists fighting for reparations. They. They just have not been accepted by our federal government as were still negotiating how to talk about slavery. [inaudible question] the racial history of our country. [inaudible question] thank you so much. [applause] thank you so much. A ready great discussion. Lite youve still have questions you can feel free ask her the table. With everybody gets up and makes their moms i just remind you how to signing works. The table here. Brenda over here to my right, real high, brenda, she is going to lead everybody around the stairs to we can form a very good line so just go see her and shell lead you around. You dont have the book already well have more. Plea before inabout you getted signed. Thank you very in and if you her your name on a sticky its night froth am human rights perspective but its also stupid, frankly, because, for example, in the syria situation, young people, only 50 of the children are in school. These children want to go to school. But theyre also its not just they want to and should be in school. These children are the future of syria. These children are the future of is syria going to be peaceful . Are they going to be engineers, the architects, the politicians, the mayors . Or are they going to be the poem would perpetuate the cycle of violence. I dont third. After words airs on book tv every sass and sunday and you can watch the previous programs on the web site, booktv. Org. After testifying before congress and making front page news with the sunnyside case, grace returned to new york and once again threw herself into the strange and unusual cases