What: "From the General Strike of the Slaves to Black Lives Matter" -- A lecture at the University of North Texas by David Roediger, Foundation Professor of American Studies at the University of Kansas. Sponsored by the UNT Departments of English, History and Sociology as part of UNT's observation of Black History Month.
When: 4 p.m. Feb. 22 (Wednesday)
Where: Room 225 of UNT's Eagle Student Services Center, 1147 Union Circle. Parking will be available in the Union Circle Parking Garage, 350 Welch
Street, using the Parkmobile app, or the Highland Street Parking Garage, 620 Central Avenue. Learn more at http://transportation.unt.edu/visitor-information.
Cost: Free
More information: Contact the UNT Department of History at 940-565-2288
DENTON (UNT), Texas -- David Roediger, who redefined ex-slaves' reactions to their new freedom after the Civil War in his book, "Seizing Freedom: Slave Emancipation and Liberty for All," will give a free lecture at the University of North Texas Feb. 22 (Wednesday).
"From the General Strike of the Slaves to Black Lives Matter" begins at 4 p.m. in Room 225 of UNT's Eagle Student Services Center, which is located at 1147 Union Circle. The lecture is being sponsored by UNT's Department of English, Department of History and Department of Sociology as part of the university's observance of Black History Month.
In "Seizing Freedom," Roediger adopted a phrase used more than 80 years ago by civil rights activist W.E.B. Du Bois to characterize emancipation and the role that slaves played in their own liberation -- the "general strike of the slaves." Roediger notes that, during the Civil War, approximately 500,000 slaves, out of 4 million total, essentially went on strike by leaving their plantations and fleeing to Union states, while many more conducted "daily mutiny" by staying, but resisting plantation labor. The slaves' emancipation, he says, emboldened other marginalized groups, such as immigrants and feminists, in their own efforts to free themselves.
Roediger has been the Foundation Professor of American Studies at the University of Kansas since fall 2014. He was previously the American Kendrick C. Babcock Professor of History at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. His other books include "How Race Survived U.S. History: From Settlement and Slavery to the Obama Phenomenon," "Working Toward Whiteness: How America's Immigrants Became White. The Strange Journey from Ellis Island to the Suburbs" and "The Wages of Whiteness: Race and the Making of the American Working Class."