Newspaper advertisements for enslaved boys who escaped into early modern London reveal very little about the freedom seekers, and rather more about those who enslaved them. But what can we learn of Cuffee, who risked everything to escape in 1701?
Features
Risk and Uncertainty
Conceptions of risk and uncertainty are traditionally applied to moments of environmental and economic crisis, both real and imagined. This new HWO series seeks to understand how ordinary people calculated perceived and real risks and uncertainties in daily life. How have differences of race, class, gender and sexuality shaped experiences of risk and uncertainty throughout history? And what can a historical understanding of risk and uncertainty in the past offer us in the present?
‘Speaking Out’ against Colonialism and Sexual Violence
When does the call for ‘speaking out’ against sexual violence begin to silence victim-survivors? Through reflecting on the #MeToo moment, Allison McKibban argues mainstream Western movements against sexual violence are often insidiously laced with colonial violence. She calls on activists and researchers to embrace a self-reflective and decolonial listening to create a truly transformative movement against sexual violence.
Child Sexual Abuse in the Family
Is the family a place of safety or a trap? Ruth Beecher explores the institution of the family and the (lack of) recognition of child sexual abuse within it.
Hearing male survivors
As part of our ‘(Un)Silenced’ series, George Severs argues that the history of male victims of rape and sexual violence should make us all alert to the ways in which gender norms silence male experiences of abuse, and prompt us to hear male survivors who are so often both silent and silenced.
Involuntary Sterilization
Can medical institutions participate in colonial violence? Allison McKibban argues the involuntary sterilization of tens of thousands of Native American women in the 1970s must be rehistoricised as part of the U.S. government’s broader campaign of genocide.
Between Vulnerability and Sexual Agency
How does society approach the sexual desires of those with disabilities? Stephanie Wright explores the history of a lack of acknowledgement of vulnerable people’s sexual autonomy , which can result in an increased possibility of harm.
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