Katherine Thomas

Annotated Bibliography

(1) Brent, Linda. Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl. Ed. L. Maria Child. Boston:
Published for the Author, 1861. The Classic Slave Narratives. Ed. Henry Louis Gates, Jr.
New York: New American Library, 2002.
The account of Harriet Jacobs’ experiences as a slave documents a strong example of a
relationship between an African American woman and her southern mistress. I hope to
analyze the work by focusing on Jacobs’ interactions with her female slaveholders both
as a young child and as a young woman in an effort to investigate the complex ties
between Southern women as they relate to gendered and racial expectations.

(2) Fox-Genovese, Elizabeth. Within the Plantation Household: Black and White
Women of the Old South. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1988.
Fox-Genovese offers a look at the gendered expectations placed upon black and white
women in the South and reiterates the importance of not simply relying on first-hand
written sources by landed gentry for the discussion. She explores white and black
womanhood on the plantation but also their relation to men. I hope to gain a broader
picture of race relations from it.

(3) Genovese, Eugene. “‘Our Family, White and Black’: Family and Household in the
Southern Slaveholders’ World View.” In Joy and Sorrow: Women, Family, and Marriage
in the Victorian South, 1830-1900. Ed. Carol Blesser. New York: Oxford University
Press, 1991.
Genovese’s essay offers a look at the complex and contradictory attitudes that
slaveholders held towards the institution of slavery both to justify it to themselves and to
active abolitionists. Genovese also constructs a new argument regarding patriarchy and
how it was perceived in the South by the landed gentry. I believe that this article will help
serve as strong foundation on which to discuss the illusion of family between slave and
slaveholder.

(4) Keckley, Elizabeth. Behind the Scenes, or, Thirty Years a Slave, and Four Years in
the White House. New York: G. W. Carleton & Co., Publishers, 1868. Documenting the
American South. 1999. University Library, The University of North Carolina at Chapel
Hill. 20 November2009. <https://vpn.nacs.uci.edu/
+CSCO+dh756767633A2F2F71627066626867752E6861702E727168 +
+/neh/keckley/keckley.html >.
This account written by Elizabeth Keckley will provide another individual’s perceptions
of her female slaveholders as well as the other white southern women for whom she
worked. I am also interested to learn about Keckley’s intimate relationship with Mary
Todd Lincoln, who was raised within a slaveholding family but became an abolitionist. I
anticipate that Keckley’s narrative of her own life will provide greater insight into the
relational dynamics between black and white women in the South.

(5) O’ Brien, Micheal. An Evening When Alone: Four Journals of Single Women in the
South, 1827-67. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1993.
Although there are only a few references to individuals in slavery, this compilation offers
an inside look into the lives of various women who lived alone in the South. I hope to
learn how these four women, without the oversight of husbands, interact with the African
Americans working on their estates, their own internal perspectives regarding slavery, or
if nothing else, their lack of regard for their slaves.

(6) Weiner, Marli Frances. “Plantation Mistresses and Female Slaves: Gender, Race, and
South Carolina Women, 1830-1860.” Diss. U of Rochester, 1986.
Weiner, under the supervision of Eugene Genovese provides a background of racialized
and gendered expectations in the South and dares to explore the ways that those may
have overlapped. By utilizing interviews of African American women in slavery as well
as accounts of female slaveholders, Weiner opens up the doors to a women’s social
history of South Carolina. I hope to use Weiner’s thesis as a starting block from which to
uncover deeper connections between women on the plantation.