Black Ghost of Empire: Comparative Emancipations in Global Perspective

Kris Manjapra (Tufts University)

"Black Ghost of Empire: Comparative Emancipations in Global Perspective"

In this talk, Kris Manjapra identifies six types of emancipations that took place during the Abolition Century (1780s-1880s)—gradual emancipations in the American North, compensated and retroactive emancipation in the Caribbean, war emancipation in the American South, conquest emancipation across Africa, and emancipation at sea. He explores how a legacy of laws and policies conspired to dispossess the freed people, and to pay reparations to enslavers. Manjapra also enquires into the “historical remainders” generated by emancipation processes, and what these mean for Black communities across the world.

Prof. Manjapra works at the intersection of transnational history and the critical study of race and colonialism. He is the author of five books, including Colonialism in Global Perspective (Cambridge, 2020) and Age of Entanglement: German and Indian Intellectuals across Empire (Harvard, 2014). The talk is drawn from his most recent book: Black Ghost of Empire: The Long Death of Slavery and the Failure of Emancipation (Scribner and Penguin, 2022)

Join by zoom:
https://soas-ac-uk.zoom.us/j/97665861045?pwd=NGRKRzMwaFlUaEp2YnJBdWtNN1B2UT09

Meeting ID: 976 6586 1045
Passcode: PzyHf9EXW0

The seminar is open to all; no registration required.
Convenor: Shabnum Tejani, st40@soas.ac.uk