Jennifer L. Morgan

Jennifer L. Morgan is a historian at New York University whose groundbreaking work examines the institutionalization of race-based slavery in early America and the Black Atlantic, with a focus on gendered exploitation and reproductive labor.

• Education: PhD in History (Duke University, 1995), BA in Third World Studies (Oberlin College, 1986)
• Research Focus: History of the Black Atlantic, Gender and Slavery, Reproductive Racial Capitalism
• Awards: Recipient of the 2024 MacArthur Fellowship, Andrew W. Mellon Fellowship, Frederick Douglass Book Prize, and Mary Nickliss Prize

Her seminal books, Laboring Women: Reproduction and Gender in New World Slavery (2004) and Reckoning with Slavery: Gender, Kinship, and Capitalism in the Early Black Atlantic (2021), analyze how enslaved women’s reproductive potential and kinship networks were commodified under slavery. Her current project, The Eve of Slavery, centers on Elizabeth Key, a Black woman who sued for freedom in 1656.

Scientific Awards:

• MacArthur Fellow (2024)
• Andrew W. Mellon Fellow (2024-2025)
• Frederick Douglass Book Prize (2022)
• Mary Nickliss Prize (2022)