Join the Institute for Research on Women and Gender (IRWG) for a lecture by historian Vanessa Holden, Associate Professor of History at the University of Kentucky and Director of the African American and Africana Studies Program. Holden's research examines slave insurrections and their impact on our understanding of the nation's founding, with particular attention to the experiences of women and children whose stories are often absent from traditional narratives of early American democracy.

Holden is also co-creator of the Freedom on the Run public humanities project, which preserves and makes accessible historical newspaper advertisements documenting the efforts of enslaved people to self-emancipate. Drawing from her scholarship and public humanities work, Holden will explore how expanding our understanding of who was present at the founding can deepen conversations about democracy, citizenship, and belonging in the United States.

Held in conjunction with programming surrounding the nation's 250th anniversary and Constitution Day, the event invites students, faculty, staff, and community members to engage with the complex histories that continue to shape American democracy today.

Copies of Holden's work and the Summer 2026 special issue of Ms. Magazine, Feminism and the Founding, will be available while supplies last.