Description
June 20 - July 16, 2010
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Director: Richard Newman, Rochester Institute of Technology
This dynamic four-week seminar will bring together fourteen school teachers and two graduate students in the summer of 2010 for close study of the abolitionist movement between the American Revolution and Civil War. To bring abolitionism alive, we will survey an exciting range of scholarly literature and primary source documents on abolitionism. We’ll discuss key themes -- including slave rebellions, the rise of black abolitionism, the prospects for inter-racial activism, women’s key role as abolitionists, the Underground Railroad, and Lincoln’s emancipation visions during the Civil War era, among others -- and talk about teaching strategies, films and websites that deal with abolitionism as a historical topic. The seminar will also welcome several terrific guest scholars, including Richard Blackett, Douglas Egerton, Scott Hancock, and Stacey Robertson, each of whom will discuss cutting edge research in the field. Finally, we’ve planned several fieldtrips to some famous abolitionist sites in the greater Philadelphia area, including black abolitionist Richard Allen’s Mother Bethel AME Church, Independence Hall (site of the Liberty Bell) and Gettysburg. In short, we’ve tried to create a seminar that is both engaging and exciting.
For more detailed information, please go to the Director’s Letter.