Data Prosopography and Archives of Violence in Nineteenth-Century Virginia

This project combines digital history methods with theories from critical archive studies to explore the intersection of data, power, documentation and violence in antebellum Virginia. It explores these issues through a history of the First African Baptist Church (FABC) in Richmond, Virginia, which, in the years before the American Civil War, was a religious space open to both free and enslaved people of color, and simultaneously a site of surveillance and violence. This project combines quantitative analysis, interactive visualization and traditional historical narrative in order to tell the history of the FABC in new ways.

The Digital History Projects Seminar at the MHS invites you to join the conversation. Seminars bring together a diverse group of scholars and interested members of the public to workshop a pre-circulated paper. Learn more.

Please note, this is an online event held on the video conference platform, Zoom. Registrants will receive an email with links to join the program.