Witnessing Modern Slavery

• In Event: 339 - Section on Comparative-Historical Sociology Paper Session. Can Comparative Historical Sociology Save the World? (4) Modern Slavery

Abstract

This paper explores the idea of bearing witness to modern slavery, and the ways in which the antislavery project (both now and in the eighteenth century) works to turn spectators into witnesses. It offers a critical assessment of the role of imagination, suffering, indignation and sympathy in constructing the figure of the modern slave, and asks what happens to concepts of labour and race, in particular, when we focus on slavery as a 'beast in the shadows', a bleeding wound in need of healing.

Author

• Laura Brace, University of Leicester