Drawing on methods from the history of emotions to study enslaved people's lives, Beth R. Wilson exposes the social, cultural and political role that emotion played in the US South. Exploring both individual and collective emotions, Wilson shows how enslaved people resisted white people's attempts to restrict their feelings and expressions by developing their own emotional ideals and expectations. Moving through case studies that examine a range of underexplored forms of testimony, the book introduces readers to slave narratives, letters, written interviews and recorded testimony to show that emotion was central to how enslaved people resisted, survived and remembered the system of slavery. Enslaved people's descriptions of their individual experiences of love, pain, grief and joy are woven throughout this study, which provides a framework that historians can use to paint a nuanced, detailed and empathetic picture of the complex emotional impact of slavery.

‘Beth Wilson’s brilliant book is a powerful contribution to the history of slavery, demonstrating how enslaved people expressed individual and collective feelings through a variety of mediums over time, each with their own emotional grammar and genre conventions. In this intimate, sensory, and interdisciplinary work Wilson challenges the notion of limited archives of slavery, inviting her reader in to sit with her and the rich array of sources.’

Erin Dwyer - Oakland University, and author of Mastering Emotions: Feelings, Power, and Slavery in the United States

‘Based on a critical engagement with the methodology of emotions history, this well-conceived book explores the grammar, genres, and mediums enslaved people used to give expression to emotions. Wilson’s critical analysis of love letters, testimonies, communal gatherings and rituals offers an illuminating history of emotions as practice that gave shape to the rich cultural and intellectual worlds of the enslaved.’

Sasha Turner - Johns Hopkins University

‘Bringing together evocative testimonies from enslaved people and theoretical insights from the history of emotions, Wilson’s highly original, powerful and methodologically sophisticated book reveals how we can understand more about the lives of enslaved people through exploring how they felt.’

Emily West - University of Oxford