Ben Franklin's World is a production of the

Omaha Institute and the sponsor for this episode is the Georgian Papers

Program.

Welcome to Ben Franklin's World, podcast about early American history with Liz Kovart.

The study of history is key to understanding who we are and how we can affect the better future.

Van Franklin's world will introduce you to historical people and events that have impacted and shaped our present day world.

And now, here's your host, Liz Koval.

Hello and welcome to episode 176 of Ben Franklin's world.

The podcast dedicated to helping you,

learn more about how the people and events of our early American past

have shaped the present day world we live in.

What did it mean to be a person and to also be a commodity in early America?

As we know, we can't really understand early American history

unless we also grapple with the institution of slavery

because the two are really intertwined. So in this episode we're going to

explore the commodification of enslaved bodies, how early Americans Turn People Into Products to Be Bought and Sold.

Dina Ramey Berry, an associate professor of history at the University of Texas Austin, and the author of

The Price for their Pound of Flesh, the value of the enslaved from

womb to grave in the building of a nation, will help us explore this topic.

Dynas spent over a decade researching the prices of enslaved people and how those prices fluctuated

over the course of an enslaved person's entire life.

So as we go behind the scenes of Dinah's research, we'll discover the prices early Americans ascribe to

...