Once We Were Slaves with Professor Laura Arnold Leibman
An obsessive genealogist and descendant of one of the most prominent Jewish families since the American Revolution, Blanche Moses firmly believed her maternal ancestors were Sephardic grandees. Yet she found herself at a dead end when it came to her grandmother's maternal line. Using family heirlooms to unlock the mystery of Moses's ancestors, "Once We Were Slaves" overturns the reclusive heiress's assumptions about her family history to reveal that her grandmother and great-uncle, Sarah and Isaac Brandon, actually began their lives as poor Christian slaves in Barbados. Tracing the siblings' extraordinary journey throughout the Atlantic World, Leibman examines artifacts they left behind in Barbados, Suriname, London, Philadelphia, and, finally, New York, to show how Sarah and Isaac were able to transform themselves and their lives, becoming free, wealthy, Jewish, and - at times - white.
About the speaker: Laura Arnold Leibman is the Leonard J. Milberg ’53 Professor in American Jewish Studies at Princeton University. Her work focuses on religion and the daily lives of women and children in early America and uses everyday objects to help bring their stories back to life. She is President of the Association for Jewish Studies, and the author of The Art of the Jewish Family: A History of Women in Early New York in Five Objects which won three National Jewish Book Awards. Her earlier book "Messianism, Secrecy, & Mysticism: A New Interpretation of Early American Jewish Life" won a Jordan Schnitzer Book Award and a National Jewish Book Award. Her most recent monograph, "Once We Were Slaves: The Extraordinary Journey of a Multiracial Jewish Family" was a finalist for a National Jewish Book Award and the Saul Viener Book Prize. She is currently working on a book about Jews and textiles during the long nineteenth century.
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