About our Speakers, Presenters & Panelists

 
 
 

John Demos, will provide the day’s opening and closing remarks. He is the Samuel Knight Professor Emeritus of History at Yale University. He was awarded the prestigious Bancroft Prize for his book Entertaining Satan: Witchcraft and the Culture of Early New England (Oxford U. Press, 1982). He was awarded the Francis Parkman Prize for his book The Unredeemed Captive: A Family Story From Early America (Knopf, 1994). He is a social historian of early America whose most recent work, Circles and Lines: The Shape of Life in Early America (Harvard University Press, 2004), is an illuminating portrait of how colonial Americans, from the first settlers to the post revolutionary generation, viewed their life experiences. He is also author of “The Heathen School: A Story of Hope and Betrayal in the Age of the Early Republic,” which traces the spectacular rise and fall of the Foreign Mission School, founded in Connecticut in 1817 explicitly to "save the world."

 

Edward Carson, the day’s moderator, is an independent historian, residential faculty member, and Dean at The Governor's Academy, in Byfield, Massachusetts. He is the current Dean of Multicultural Education and member of the History Department. His current research looks at race, religion, and Black thought, particularly that of W.E.B. Du Bois. His working manuscript is W.E.B. Du Bois's Editorial Influence on African American Life. He has published and presented papers in peer-reviewed journals and conferences on Black identity, religion, Du Bois, and the nature of history teaching. Joined by historians Phillip Luke Sinitiere and Gerald Horne, they recently published Socialism and Democracy in the Life Thought, and Legacy of W.E.B. Du Bois. Edward will be this year’s speaker for the William Lloyd Garrison lecture in December 2021.

 

Manisha Sinha, morning keynote presenter, is the Draper Chair in American History at the University of Connecticut. She received her Ph.D. from Columbia University where her dissertation was nominated for the Bancroft prize. For over 20 years she taught at the University of Massachusetts where she was awarded the Chancellor’s Medal, the highest honor bestowed on faculty. She is the author of The Counterrevolution of Slavery: Politics and Ideology in Antebellum South Carolina (University of North Carolina Press, 2000), which was named one of the 10 best books on slavery in Politico in 2015, and featured in The New York Times 1619 Project. Her recent book, the multiple-award winning The Slave's Cause: A History of Abolition (Yale University Press, 2016), was long-listed for the National Book Award for Non Fiction. She is currently writing a book on the Reconstruction of American democracy after the Civil War under contract with Liveright (WW Norton).

 

Kabria Baumgartner, presenter and panelist, is the Dean's Associate Professor of History and Africana Studies at Northeastern University. She is a scholar of nineteenth-century African American history with a particular focus on women and education. Baumgartner's first book, In Pursuit of Knowledge: Black Women and Educational Activism in Antebellum America (New York University Press, 2019) has won four book prizes, including the 2021 Outstanding Book Award from the American Educational Research Association. She has also published numerous scholarly articles and book chapters, and her op-eds and other popular writing have been featured in the Washington Post and Historic New England Magazine. She is writing her second book on the African American struggle for civil rights in nineteenth-century Boston.

 

James DeWolf Perry, presenter and panelist, served as the principal historical consultant for the Emmy-nominated documentary film “Traces of the Trade,” director Katrina Browne’s exploration of the role of her ancestors, the DeWolf family of Rhode Island, in the Atlantic slave trade. James co-founded the Tracing Center on Histories and Legacies of Slavery, serving as its executive director before stepping down to become a stay-at-home dad. Perry is the co-editor of Interpreting Slavery at Museums and Historic Sites (Rowman & Littlefield, 2015) and author of numerous essays on teaching and interpreting the history of slavery. He has designed and led public programs on racial healing and equity, as well as professional workshops in education and public history. He also serves on the board of directors of the Center for Reconciliation in Providence, R.I.

 

Allegra di Bonaventura, presenter and panelist, is the Associate Dean for Academic Support at Yale’s Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, where she oversees academic affairs for students in Ph.D., M.A., and M.S. programs across the university. Allegra earned an A.B. (History and German) and an A.M. (German) from Middlebury College, and was a Fulbright Fellow to Italy. She also holds a J.D. from Yale Law School and a Ph.D. (History) from Yale University, where her dissertation received the William Egleston Prize. Allegra is the author of For Adam’s Sake: A Family Saga in Colonial New England, winner of the New England Historical Association’s James P. Hanlan Book Award and named one of The Wall Street Journal’s best books of 2013.

 

Keidrick Roy, presenter and panelist, is a Ph.D. candidate at Harvard University, working at the intersection of American literature, intellectual history and political philosophy. He examines slavery, abolitionism and media history in the transatlantic world since the 18th century. Roy is committed to supporting community discussions about the history of race in America and to analyzing our present moment within its broader historical context. His ongoing public scholarship has been featured by CBS Sunday Morning, the Harvard Gazette, the Public News Service, The Christian Science Monitor, the Chicago Review of Books and the National Football League. A graduate of the Air Force Academy and formerly an Air Force nuclear operations officer, Roy’s scholarly work has been supported by the (Pat) Tillman Foundation, the Ford Foundation and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

 

John Stauffer, afternoon keynote presenter and panelist, is the Kates Professor of English and of African and African American Studies at Harvard University. He is the author or editor of 20 books and over 100 articles, including GIANTS: The Parallel Lives of Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln, a national bestseller; and the award-winning Black Hearts of Men and Picturing Frederick Douglass. His essays and reviews have appeared in Time, Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post and in exhibition catalogs, journals, and books. He has presented on national radio and TV and served as a consultant or co-curator on films, exhibitions and video games, including “God in America,” “Django Unchained,” “The Free State of Jones,” “The Abolitionists,” “Picturing Frederick Douglass,” “Red Dead Redemption 2” and “Reconstruction: America After the Civil War.” He is working on a biography of Charles Sumner and curating an exhibition on Frederick Douglass for the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery.