Annette Gordon-Reed
Annette Gordon-Reed | |
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MacArthur Fellowship, Pulitzer Prize for History |
Annette Gordon-Reed (born November 19, 1958)
She was awarded the
Background and education
Gordon-Reed was born in
Marriage and family
Gordon-Reed is married to Robert R. Reed, a justice of the
Professional and academic career
Gordon-Reed spent her early career as an associate at Cahill Gordon & Reindel, and as counsel to the New York City Board of Corrections. She speaks or moderates at numerous conferences across the country on history and law-related topics. She was previously Wallace Stevens Professor of Law at New York Law School (1992–2010) and Board of Governors Professor of History at Rutgers University, Newark (2007–2010).[7]
In 2010, she joined Harvard University with joint appointments in history and law, and as Carol K. Pforzheimer Professor at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study. In 2012, she was appointed the Charles Warren Professor of American Legal History at HLS. In 2014, she was the Harold Vyvyan Harmsworth Visiting professor at Queen's College, University of Oxford.
Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings: An American Controversy (1997)
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Her first book sparked considerable interest from fellow scholars, as it investigated and analyzed the long-standing historical controversy of whether Thomas Jefferson had a sexual relationship with his slave Sally Hemings and fathered children by her. Most academic historians had accepted the denials of Jefferson descendants and their assertion that the late Peter Carr (a married nephew of Jefferson) was the father. Biographer James Parton adopted this alternative account to rumors about Jefferson's paternity, as did succeeding historians for more than 100 years.
As some historians began to reinvestigate Jefferson in the late twentieth century, his defenders responded as if assertions of his paternity were intended to damage his historical reputation, despite the widespread acknowledgement by then of the numerous interracial liaisons in Jefferson's time. In 1974, Fawn M. Brodie wrote the first biography of Jefferson to seriously examine the evidence related to Sally Hemings; she thought the Hemings-Jefferson liaison was likely.
Gordon-Reed analyzed the historiography and identified the set of unexamined assumptions that had governed the investigations by many Jefferson scholars. These assumptions were that white people tell the truth, black people lie, slave owners tell the truth, and slaves lie. Gordon-Reed cross-checked the versions of events provided by former Monticello slaves, such as Madison Hemings, who claimed Jefferson as his father, and Isaac Jefferson, who confirmed Thomas Jefferson's paternity of the Hemings children, against documented historical evidence to which they could not have had access. She similarly cross-checked oral traditions among Hemings' descendants against such primary sources as Jefferson's papers and agricultural records. She demonstrated errors made by historians, and noted facts overlooked by the white Jefferson descendants and historians, which contradicted their assertions that one or more of Jefferson's Carr nephews had fathered the children.
As the historian
External videos | |
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Booknotes interview with Gordon-Reed on Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings, February 21, 1999, C-SPAN[9] |
Reception
Gordon-Reed "drew on her legal training to apply context and reasonable interpretation to the sparse documentation" and analyzed the historiography as well.[7] The writer Christopher Hitchens in Slate described her analysis as "brilliant."
Critics such as John Works and Robert F. Turner of the Thomas Jefferson Heritage Society have pointed out several transcription errors in Gordon-Reed's first book. Although Gordon-Reed said the errors were a "mistake," Works and Turner have alleged them to be alterations of historical documents.[10]
Gordon-Reed's study stimulated a revival of interest in this topic. In 1998 a Y-DNA study was conducted of direct male descendants of the Jefferson male line, Eston Hemings line, and Carrs, as this DNA is passed down virtually unchanged. There was a
In 2000, the Thomas Jefferson Foundation, which operates Monticello, announced that its internal study had concluded that Jefferson was likely the father of Eston and all of Hemings' children. It has since changed its exhibits, programming, academic research and other materials to reflect this. In 2001 the National Genealogical Society published a special issue on the topic; its specialists demonstrated how their review of the weight of evidence led them to conclude that Thomas Jefferson was the father of Hemings's children.[12]
The William and Mary Quarterly devoted an issue to the topic in 2001. In June 2018, the Thomas Jefferson Foundation mounted an exhibit at Monticello, The Life of Sally Hemings, which affirms that Jefferson fathered her children. This follows a major traveling exhibit in 2012 on Jefferson as a slaveholder and accounts of several major slave families at Monticello, including the Hemingses.[citation needed]
Some historians disagree with the current consensus. The Thomas Jefferson Heritage Society was formed as a "response to efforts by many historical revisionists to inaccurately portray Thomas Jefferson as a liar, fraud, hypocrite, and child molesting slave rapist."[13] It commissioned a study which contradicted the findings of Gordon-Reed and other Jefferson scholars.[14]
Vernon Can Read! (2001)
This memoir of Vernon Jordan, the civil rights activist, written with him, portrayed his life from childhood through the 1980s. It won the Best Nonfiction Book for 2001 from the Black Caucus of the American Library Association. In 2002 it won an Anisfield-Wolf Book Award and a Trailblazer Award from the Metropolitan Black Bar Association.[15]
The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family (2008)
In 2008 Gordon-Reed published The Hemingses of Monticello, the first volume of a planned two-volume history on the Hemings family and their descendants, bringing a slave family to life on their own terms. She traced the many descendants of Elizabeth Hemings and their families during the time that they lived at Monticello; she had 75 descendants there. It was widely praised for its groundbreaking treatment of an extended slave family. It won the Pulitzer Prize for History[16][17] and 15 additional awards.[18]
Andrew Johnson (2011)
In 2011, Gordon-Reed published a biography of the US post-Civil War president
Gordon-Reed argues in the book that much of the misery imposed on African Americans could have been avoided if they had been given portions of land to cultivate as their own. Without land, African Americans in the
Awards and recognition
Gordon-Reed was the first African American to win the Pulitzer Prize for History, for her 2008 work on the Hemings family.[16][17][20] She won 15 additional awards for the book.[18][21][22]
- 2008
- National Book Award for Nonfiction,[23]
- Society for Historians of the Early American Republic Book Award
- 2009
- Pulitzer Prize in History,
- George Washington Book Prize,[24]
- Anisfield-Wolf Book Award,[25]
- New Jersey Council of the Humanities Book Award,[26]
- Frederick Douglass Prize,[27]
- Owsley Award from the Southern Historical Association,[28] and
- Library of Virginia Literary Award.[16][28]
- 2010
- On February 25, 2010, President Barack Obama honored Annette Gordon-Reed with the National Humanities Medal, the highest national honor for the arts and humanities.[29]
- On September 28, 2010, Gordon-Reed was awarded a
Gordon-Reed has also received a
On March 7, 2009, she was interviewed on the WBGO program Conversations with Allan Wolper. She discussed the intimate relationship between Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings, as well as issues that American black women face today.[31]
- 2020
- On July 28, 2020, she was named a University Professor, Harvard University's highest faculty honor. Claudine Gay, the Edgerley Family Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences and the Wilbur A. Cowett Professor of Government and of African and African-American Studies, said, "This is a wonderful recognition of Annette's seminal contributions to our understanding of American history, including our most harrowing tragedies and painful contradictions. She reminds us of the transformative power of academic discovery. I am thrilled by this appointment."[32]
2021
- On July 23, 2021, she was elected a corresponding fellow of the British Academy.[33]
Bibliography (books only)
- 1997 – Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings: An American Controversy (University of Virginia Press)
- 1998 – reprint with new foreword discussing DNA evidence
- 2001 – Vernon Can Read!: A Memoir (with Vernon Jordan) (PublicAffairs)
- 2002 – Race on Trial: Law and Justice in American History (Oxford University Press)
- 2008 – The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family (W. W. Norton & Company)
- 2011 – Andrew Johnson: The American Presidents Series—The 17th President, 1865–1869 (Times Books/Henry Holt)
- 2016 – Most Blessed of the Patriarchs: Thomas Jefferson and the Empire of the Imagination (Liveright)[34]
- 2021 – On Juneteenth (Liveright)
References
- ^ Jennie Yabroff (October 4, 2008). "Annette Gordon-Reed on the Sally Hemings Saga". Newsweek. Retrieved September 11, 2010.
- ^ "Professor Annette Gordon-Reed '84 wins a MacArthur Fellowship (audio)". Harvard Law Today.
- ^ "Board of Trustees and Officers | Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History".
- Atlanta, Georgia. Retrieved July 21, 2021.
born in Livingston, Texas, which was segregated, and then when I was about six months old, moved to Conroe, Texas, where I grew up. I had the experience as a six-year-old of integrating our town's schools,
- ^ "Annette Gordon-Reed '84 to join the Harvard faculty". Recent News and Spotlights, April 30, 2010. Harvard Law School.
- ^ Finn, Robin (June 28, 2009). "Only a Brief Pause for Rest". New York Times.
- ^ a b c "Annette Gordon-Reed". MacArthur Foundation. Retrieved February 16, 2023.
- ^ "Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings: An American Controversy". cnn. March 3, 1999. Retrieved December 15, 2014.
- ^ "Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings". C-SPAN. February 21, 1999. Retrieved March 14, 2017.
- ^ "The Dialogue Between John Works and Annette Gordon-Reed and the Dean of New York Law School". Thomas Jefferson Heritage Society.
- ^ "Annette Gordon-Reed: Rutgers-Newark Appoints Nationally Renowned Presidential Scholar to Faculty", History News Network. Retrieved 2011-02-09.
- ^ National Genealogical Society Quarterly, Vol. 89, No. 3, September 2001, p. 207
- ^ "Thomas Jefferson Heritage Society". Thomas Jefferson Heritage Society. Retrieved November 6, 2022.
- ^ "Fauquier Heritage Institute News Release". Thomas Jefferson Heritage Society. Retrieved November 6, 2022.
- ^ a b "Annette Gordon-Reed '84 to join the Harvard faculty". Law.harvard.edu. April 30, 2010. Retrieved September 11, 2010.
- ^ a b c "Rutgers-Newark prof Annette Gordon-Reed wins Pulitzer Prize"
- ^ a b "History". Past winners & finalists by category. The Pulitzer Prizes. Retrieved 2016-10-20.
- ^ a b Jennie Yabroff, "A Lawyer's New Jefferson Memorial: The next chapter in the Hemings saga", Newsweek On Conversations With Allan Wolper Archived 2014-10-10 at the Wayback Machine (March 7, 2009), Ms. Gordon-Reed said one of the reasons she wrote the book was to prove that African Americans could write about white politicians.
- ^ a b Interview with Annette Gordon-Reed, Tavis Smiley show, 28 February 2011
- ^ Michael Bandler, "Pulitzer Prize for Drama Honors Play about Women in Wartime Congo: Biography, Fiction, History, Music, Nonfiction, Poetry Winners Also Named" Archived February 7, 2011, at the Wayback Machine
- ^ Hoffert, Barbara. "2008 NBCC Finalists Announced]". Archived from the original on June 1, 2009. Retrieved October 9, 2009.
- ^ Columbia University Archived June 23, 2010, at the Wayback Machine
- ^ "National Book Awards – 2008". National Book Foundation. Retrieved 2012-03-24.
(With acceptance speech by Gordon-Reed and interview.) - ^ ""2009 George Washington Book Prize Awarded at Mount Vernon"". Archived from the original on July 19, 2011. Retrieved October 9, 2009.
- ^ "Anisfield-Wolf Book Awards :: 2006 Winners". Anisfield-wolf.org. Archived from the original on August 23, 2010. Retrieved September 11, 2010.
- ^ "Awards – NJCH Annual Book Award". NJCH. Archived from the original on November 25, 2010. Retrieved September 11, 2010.
- ^ "New York Law School Professor Wins $25,000 Frederick Douglass Book Prize". Archived from the original on March 29, 2010. Retrieved October 9, 2009.
- ^ a b "Library of Virginia Literary Award | W. W. Norton & Company". Books.wwnorton.com. Retrieved September 11, 2010.
- ^ "Obama honors leaders in arts and humanities". washingtonpost.com. February 26, 2010. Retrieved September 11, 2010.
- ^ "Annette Gordon-Reed", NPR
- ^ "ANNETTE GORDON-REED AND ALLAN WOLPER"
- ^ "Annette Gordon-Reed named Harvard University Professor". July 28, 2020.
- ^ "The British Academy elects 84 new Fellows recognising outstanding achievement in the humanities and social sciences". The British Academy. July 23, 2021. Archived from the original on July 23, 2021. Retrieved January 22, 2022.
- ^ http://www.pulitzer.org/prize-winners-by-category/220
External links
- "Annette Gordon-Reed". Harvard Faculty Directory
- Appearances on C-SPAN
- Annette Gordon-Reed talks at The University of Sydney on ABC Fora VIDEO
- "Annette Gordon-Reed Receives MacArthur Genius Grant". Archived from the original on October 5, 2010. Retrieved October 8, 2010.