Stealing America: The Hidden Story of Indigenous Slavery in U.S. History with Linford D. Fisher

Tuesday, October 13, 6-7 p.m. Eastern Time

In this reframing of American history, Brown University historian Linford Fisher traces the institution of slavery back to the earliest days of colonial settlement. Stealing America demonstrates how the enslavement of Indigenous people began just after 1492 and, for centuries following, was a key feature of land dispossession and colonial expansion.

Following Christoper Columbus’s landing on this continent, an estimated three to six million Native Americans were affected by colonial settlement. Although largely erased from the public consciousness, the enslavement of Natives began then and continued for centuries, affecting nearly 600,000 Native Americans in North America. Stealing America  reveals the shocking truth that American colonizers—from Virginia to California, New England to Barbados—enslaved Natives in roughly the same numbers as they imported enslaved Africans. Captured Natives were often deliberately mislabeled as Black slaves to avoid detection. This enslavement and plundering of Indigenous lands, Fisher writes, “was central to the origins, growth, and eventual success of the English colonies and the United States—not just initially but throughout all of American history.” Nearly fifteen years in the making, Stealing America reframes American history at its core.

Linford D. Fisher is an associate professor of history at Brown University. The author of  The Indian Great Awakening and principal investigator of the Stolen Relations project, he lives in Providence, Rhode Island.