Gendered Resistance

"Inspired by the story of Margaret Garner, who in 1856 slit her daughter's throat rather than have her forced back into slavery, the essays in this collection focus on historical and contemporary examples of resistance, and issues of slavery and freedom from the eighteenth through the twenty-first centuries. The story of Margaret Garner offered the narrative for Toni Morrison's Beloved, the opera Margaret Garner, and much controversy in its time over whether Garner's actions exemplified the evils of the institution of slavery or justified the continued control over African Americans who might perform such an act. Divided into two main sections, the book first addresses the historical and cultural aspects of gendered resistance in the US during the first half of the nineteenth century as enslaved women and men struggled to survive in and escape from a system that thrived on their bondage. In the second half of the volume, the focus turns to contemporary global slavery to examine the psychological consequences of trauma and sexual violence in a number of geographic locations, including Brazil, Yemen, India, and the United States"--