Susan Eva O'Donovan

I'm an associate professor of history at the University of Memphis. But while I may live and work in the Mid-South, my heart remains firmly rooted in the interior Pacific Northwest, land of pine and fir forests, basalt cliffs, and wide open and wild spaces. As a product of a working class family in a working class community made up primarily of loggers, farmers,and stock raisers, I have always been drawn to the role of workers in history. An endless curiosity in their everyday experiences has informed all my research, starting with a book that explored the work enslaved people performed for their owners in bondage and how those experiences shaped the gendered dimensions of freedom. More recently, I have turned my attention more fully to the enslaved, a population of women and men who, in doing their owners' bidding, fashioned themselves into a powerful, political force, one that would help bring slavery to an end.