Legacies of slave-ownership in Europe: a workshop

17 September 2012

Workshop

The Legacies of British Slave-ownership project, based in the Department of History at UCL, has been researching slave-ownership in the British Empire and its importance to the formation of modern Britain. In summer 2012, the project will launch its free-to-use online Encyclopaedia of British Slave-owners, a comprehensive biographical survey of slave-owners at the moment of chattel slavery's abolition in 1833.

This one-day workshop looks to explore slave-ownership and its legacies through a European lens. Beginning with a presentation of the LBS project and its historiographical context, scholars of other European empires will then survey the history and historiography of slave-ownership in their own fields. Each contribution will be followed by a group discussion.

• What was the history of slave-ownership in different European imperial contexts? And how have these histories been situated within national and public histories of slavery and the slave-trade?
• How do the histories and historiographies of slave-ownership differ across European contexts? How do they converge?
• What sources are available for researching slave-ownership?
• What possibilities are there for future collaboration? Would it be worthwhile to establish a formal or informal European network on slave-ownership?

The workshop is primarily a working session with eight principal discussants plus invited delegates. There is a limited number of extra spaces for interested members of the UCL community or public.

The workshop is funded under the European Institute's Small Grants Scheme 2011-12.

Workshop organiser: the Legacies of British Slave-ownership project
Prof Catherine Hall, Dr Nick Draper, Mr Keith McClelland
Department of History, UCL

Contact: lbs@ucl.ac.uk
Website: www.ucl.ac.uk/lbs/