Ben Franklin's World is a production of the Yomahundro Institute.

Hello and welcome to episode 308 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.

And I'm your host, Liz Covart.

Every year, there seems to be a handful of history books that cause a stir among historians.

These are the books that historians can't seem to stop talking about, and at least once

or twice a year, I try to place at least one of these books into our editorial calendar

so that you can get an idea of what historians are talking about and what historical research

seems most exciting to them.

Well, today's conversation is about one of these most talked about books.

It's called Wicked Flash, Black Women, Intimacy, and Freedom in the Atlantic World.

Now, when Wicked Flash, Johns Hopkins University History Professor Jessica Marie Johnson takes

us into the Atlantic world of colonial New Orleans and Louisiana to show us how the story

of freedom in colonial New Orleans tended to pivot on the choices that black women made

to retain control of their bodies, their families, and their futures.

But how did black women in colonial Louisiana navigate French and Spanish black codes or

slavery codes to retain control of their bodies, families, and futures?

While during our conversation, Jessica will answer this question as well as reveal details

about French entry into colonization and the diplomacy they needed to conduct to establish

a trade with the West Coast of Africa.

The place of colonial New Orleans and Louisiana within the larger world of Atlantic trade

...