Genevieve Johnson

Using the career of the formerly enslaved freedom fighter Moses Roper as a springboard, this research explores fugitive abolitionism, emancipatory activism, anti-slavery radicalism and print culture in Wales. This is a Collaborative Doctoral Award in partnership with the National Library of Wales in Aberystwyth, where much of the primary research will take place. This project involves research into the Black Atlantic, Welsh language publication, transatlantic abolitionism, literary and performative activism and anti-slavery activism in Wales and Britain more widely. This project involves extensive study of existing secondary literature as well as examination of primary sources, particularly nineteenth-century newspaper articles and genealogy records, slave narratives and other written testimonies.

This project moves away from the traditional “British” lens of nineteenth-century transatlantic anti-slavery study and establishes Wales as its own singular anti-slavery entity, as well as centering the work of Moses Roper as opposed to other better known Black abolitionists of this era.