Bücher von Wilma A. (Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University) Dunaway

Wilma Dunaway contends that studies of the slave family have been flawed by neglect of small plantations and exaggeration of slave agency. Using population trends and slave narratives, she identifies several profit-maximizing strategies that owners implemented to disrupt and endanger African-American families during the Civil War and Reconstruction.

Wilma Dunaway breaks new ground by focusing on slave experiences on small plantations in the Upper South. She draws on a vast array of primary sources to argue that a region was not buffered from the social impacts of enslavement simply because it was characterized by low black population density.