INVESTIGATING MID-ATLANTIC PLANTATIONS: SLAVERY, ECONOMIES, AND SPACE

Clarissa Lowry Announcement
Announcement Type
Conference
Location
Pennsylvania, United States
Subject Fields
Economic History / Studies, American History / Studies

Early North American plantations were not confined to places south of the Mason-Dixon Line. In the mid-Atlantic region, where fertile farmland and deep-water ports provided complementary economic engines, agricultural estates exploiting coerced labor grew in close proximity to urban centers where Northern and Southern interests co-mingled. This conference seeks to understand the distinctive qualities of plantation complexes in the middle colonies and new states while also comparing them to better-known Southern institutions and situating them within the larger contexts of the British Atlantic and the United States.

This conference brings academics, public historians, museum professionals, and others together to examine the phenomenon of mid-Atlantic plantations through interdisciplinary lenses. Scholars will bring their varied backgrounds and research findings to discussions of economic, familial, and religious networks; slavery, indenture, and free labor; land ownership and land development; agriculture, architecture, and spatial relationships; and the construction of gendered and racial categories on mid-Atlantic plantations.

 

Conference Schedule:

October 17:

The Library Company of Philadelphia, 1314 Locust Street

4:30pm – 7:00pm: Roundtable & Opening Reception

 

October 18: 

McNeil Center for Early American Studies, University of Pennsylvania, 3355 Woodland Walk

8:30am – 7:00pm

 

October 19:

Stenton Museum, 4601 N. 18th Street

9:00am – 5:30pm

 

See the Full Schedule Here 

 

Contact Information

Cathy Matson, Director of the Program in Early American Economy and Society at the Library Company of Philadelphia 

Contact Email
cmatson@udel.edu