Sodomy and Racial Difference in Early Barbary Captivity Narratives

January 26, 12:00pm - 1:15pm
Mānoa Campus, Henke Hall 325

This paper focuses on early Barbary captivity narratives, which were popular stories of Christian sailors who were kidnapped and sold into slavery in the Barbary States' extensive slave market during the sixteenth through nineteenth centuries.

My paper focuses specifically on the print culture that grew up around Barbary captivity narratives during the long eighteenth century, when sermons, first-person accounts, novels and fictionalized stories became popular commodities amongst readers in north America and in England. The material from this presentation is drawn from my book project on the eighteenth-century history of sexuality, and the presentation itself discusses early representations of the fear of sodomy in Barbary captivity narratives, and the way that these fears intersected with fears of miscegenation and racial difference in the Atlantic world.

Speaker Bio:
Greta LaFleur is an assistant professor in the English department at the University of Hawai'i at Manoa. She is currently working on a book project, American Insides: Popular Narrative and the Historiography of Sexuality, 1674-1815, on long eighteenth century print culture and the cultural emergence of sexology.


Event Sponsor
Center for Biographical Research, Mānoa Campus

More Information
956-3774, biograph@hawaii.edu, http://www.facebook.com/CBRHawaii

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