Simon Middleton, “Changing Forms of Value: The Shift to Paper Money in Eighteenth-Century America”

05/29/20 • 18 min

We tend to think of money as a familiar object that plays a role in our everyday lives. However, when we consider the changing nature of currency in colonial America, money appears differently—as a “social technology for the distribution of value.” Because money allows individuals to represent and share value in direct and visible ways, the transition to the use of paper money in the United States in the eighteenth century supplemented social connections derived from transactions and bolstered economic consumption. In this podcast, historian Simon Middleton from the College of William and Mary discusses how his work participates in interdisciplinary discourses to examine the cultural, legal, and social dimensions of money. His reflections reach into the present moment by considering how the COVID-19 pandemic and previous recessions make us confront the ways that such financial crises are not necessarily a result of a lack of money, but the result of an uneven division and distribution of global value. https://nationalhumanitiescenter.org/simon-middleton-changing-forms-of-value-paper-money-18th-century-america/

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Christina Snyder, “Slavery After the Civil War: How Bondage Persisted in the US and its Territories”

As commonly understood, slavery in the United States officially came to an end with the surrender of the Confederacy and the passage of the Thirteenth Amendment. Yet various forms of human bondage and forced labor continued across the United States and its territories long after the conclusion of the Civil War and into the twentieth century. In this podcast, historian Christina Snyder from The Pennsylvania State University discusses her work, examining why multiple forms of unfree labor and bondage persisted across the United States long after chattel slavery was abolished. https://nationalhumanitiescenter.org/christina-snyder-slavery-after-civil-war-how-bondage-persisted/

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Marsha Gordon, “Narrating Modern Women’s Experiences: The Complex Legacy of Ursula Parrott”

In the 1930s, the writer Ursula Parrott used her novels, short stories, and screenwriting ventures to portray independent women during a period of immense social change in America. Despite this, like many women writers, Parrott’s legacy has been all but erased from the popular imagination. In this podcast, Marsha Gordon, professor of film studies at North Carolina State University, delves into the way that Parrott’s independence and professional success existed in a complex relationship to her rather conservative views on gender. Understanding Parrott as a woman out of sync with her own time allows us to understand how she was influenced by the limitations of her society even while she envisioned a more progressive future. https://nationalhumanitiescenter.org/marsha-gordon-complex-legacy-ursula-parrott/