Last Book
Chained in Silence
Black women and convict Labor In the New South
The American Civil War effectively ended the South's access to enslaved labor. However, the abolition of chattel slavery gave rise to a new system of forced labor known as convict leasing. Chained in Silence examines the history of this system, documenting the transition from a slave state to a carceral state, where prisons provided a continuous supply of Black captive laborers, including Black women. This groundbreaking book redefines the history of Black women's lives and labor in the post-Civil War South, allowing their stories to be told for the first time.
Writings
The Washington Post
Five Myths About Slavery
No, the Civil War didn’t end slavery, and the first Africans didn’t arrive in America in 1619...
The Washington Post
Historians: What kids should be learning in school right now
Kids should be taught about slavery’s demise. But they should also learn about its evolution and its legacies...
The Root
This Black History Month, Let’s Recognize the African American Prisoners Who Helped Build America
Like much of the rest of the discourse around jails, prisons and mass incarceration, Black History Month is not usually a time when we talk about the thousands of black prisoners that were forced to build America after the Civil War...
The Atlantic
When Slavery is Erased from Plantations
The story of Sally Hemings—the enslaved woman who bore six of Thomas Jefferson’s children—is told from the basement of Jefferson’s mansion...
Vox
5 Things People Still Get Wrong About Slavery
The United States has the highest prison population in the world. More than 2.2 million Americans are incarcerated; 4.5 million are on probation or parole...
Articles & Book Chapters
“Sewing and Spinning for the State: Incarcerated Black Female Garment Workers in the Jim Crow South”
Crime and Punishment in the Jim Crow South, edited by Amy Louise Wood and Natalie J. Ring (University of Illinois Press)
LeFlouria examines how incarcerated Black women in Tennessee and Alabama fueled the growth of the southern garment industry through prison labor. Centering their experiences in hosiery mills and prison factories, she reveals how race, gender, punishment, and industrial capitalism intersected to shape the modern Jim Crow South.
“‘The Hand that Rocks the Cradle Cuts Cordwood’: Exploring Black Women’s Lives and Labor in Georgia’s Convict Camps, 1865–1917”
Labor: Studies in Working-Class History of the Americas, Vol. 8, No. 3 (Special Issue: “Labor in the Correctional State”)
LeFlouria examines the lives of Black women imprisoned in Georgia's convict camps between 1865 and 1917, revealing how their labor fueled the industrial growth of the New South. Through stories of blacksmiths, farm workers, and resisters, she exposes the intersections of race, gender, punishment, and economic exploitation.
“Menacing (Re)Production: The Commodification and De-Commodification of Incarcerated Black Women’s Wombs and Work”
Caging Borders and Carceral States: Incarcerations, Immigration Detentions, and Resistance (edited by Robert T. Chase)
LeFlouria traces how the reproductive lives of Black women shifted from slavery to the convict-lease system, arguing that their bodies were simultaneously exploited and devalued. Through stories of imprisonment, forced labor, pregnancy, and family separation, she exposes the enduring connection between racial capitalism and carceral control.
“‘Under the Sting of the Lash: Gendered Violence, Terror, and Resistance in the South’s Convict Camps”
The Journal of African American History, Vol. 100, No. 3 (Special Issue: “Gendering the Carceral State: African American Women, History, and the Criminal Justice System”)
LeFlouria examines how Black women imprisoned in the post–Civil War South endured sexual violence, forced labor, and psychological terror within convict camps while simultaneously developing strategies of resistance and survival. The essay reveals how gender shaped incarceration, exposing the brutal intersection of race, labor, punishment, and state power.