Slavery has been called America’s “original sin,” a centuries-long moral catastrophe that was both inextricable from the country’s growth and development and that almost sundered it in two. Since 1865, slavery and its legacy have been uncovered and whitewashed, illuminated and disavowed, remembered and reimagined.

This reading group aims to consider how Americans “picture” slavery – the scenes, images, and assumptions that shape our understanding of it – and how those pictures align with or depart from the historical record. Who are the heroes and the villains, what were the historical causes, and what have been the long-lingering consequences? What challenges do writers and filmmakers face in bringing the story of slavery and its legacy to life?

While our readings will include various 19th century texts in excerpt or in entirety, we will focus particularly on contemporary fiction and film from the past two decades. Over the course of our investigations, we hope to expand our mental picture gallery to better understand the contemporary significance of slavery’s role and legacy in American history and art.

The Picturing Slavery group meets at the Athenæum on the second Thursday of each month (excluding November, when it is the first Thursday) from September 2021 to May 2022, 5:30-7pm.

*VIRTUAL MEETING* Thurs, September 9 | Picturing slavery (excerpts and prompts will be given during the session).

Thurs, October 14 | Colson Whitehead, The Underground Railroad

Thurs, November 4 | Frederick Douglass, My Bondage and My Freedom

Thurs, December 9 | James McBride, The Good Lord Bird

Thurs, January 13 | 12 Years a Slave (dir. Steve McQueen)

Thurs, February 10 | Edward P. Jones, The Known World

Thurs, March 10 | Jones, The Known World continued

Thurs, April 14 | Kaitlyn Greenidge, Libertie: A Novel

Thurs, May 12 | Traces of the Trade: A Story of the Deep North (dir. Browne, Kovgan, Ray) & “Picture Gallery” revisited.

Iain Bernhoft is a Visiting Assistant Professor at Providence College, where he teaches English and Humanities courses. He holds a PhD in American Literature from Boston University, and his writing has appeared in Modern Fiction Studies, the Cormac McCarthy Journal, Commonweal, and elsewhere. Iain lives on the East Side of Providence with his wife and two young sons. They first became acquainted with the joys of the Athenæum not as scholars but as connoisseurs of its splendid collection of children’s books.

Patrick Breen is an associate professor in the Department of History and Classics at Providence College. He has written on the history of slavery, including The Land Shall Be Deluged in Blood,: A New History of the Nat Turner Revolt (Oxford UP, 2016). Although he has never led an Athenæum reading group, he has greatly appreciated his chance to read Thucydides and Herodotus with Johanna Hanink and the other careful reader in those reading groups. He lives in Providence with his wife and five children.