MARGARET ABRUZZO

History Department
Box 870212
Tuscaloosa, AL 35487-0212
mabruzzo@ua.edu
EDUCATION
Ph.D. in History, University of Notre Dame, August 2005
M.A. in History, University of Notre Dame, 2003
B.A. in History summa cum laude, University of Dallas, 1999
POSITIONS
Associate Professor, University of Alabama, 2012Assistant Professor, University of Alabama, 2006-2012
Edward F. Sorin Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Notre Dame, 2005-2006
CURRENT RESEARCH INTERESTS
Changing conceptions of sin, wrongdoing, and moral responsibility in the eighteenth and nineteenth
centuries
BOOK
Polemical Pain: Slavery, Cruelty, and the Rise of Humanitarianism. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins
University Press, 2011.
ARTICLES
The Sins of Slaves and the Slaves of Sin: Toward a History of Moral Agency, in The Worlds of
American Intellectual History, eds. James Kloppenberg, Michael OBrien, Joel Isaac, and Jennifer
Ratner-Rosenhagen (forthcoming, Oxford University Press).
The Cruelty of Slavery, The Cruelty of Freedom: Colonization and the Politics of Humaneness in
the Early Republic, in Affect and Abolition in the Anglo-Atlantic, 1770-1830, ed. Stephen Ahern
(Farnham, England: Ashgate Press, 2013), 189-209.
Antislavery and Proslavery, in The Oxford Encyclopedia of American Cultural and Intellectual History, eds.
Joan Shelley Rubin and Scott Casper (New York: Oxford University Press, 2013).
Apologetics of Harmony: Mathew Carey and the Rhetoric of Religious Liberty, Pennsylvania
Magazine of History and Biography 134, no. 1 (January 2010): 5-30.
A Humane MasterAn Oblidging NeighborA True Philanthropist: Slavery, Cruelty, and Moral
Philosophy, Princeton University Library Chronicle 66, no. 3 (2005* [2009]): 492-511. [PULC is behind
in its publishing schedule; the article was written and published in 2009]

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BOOK REVIEWS AND REVIEW ESSAYS

Review of Molly Oshatz, Slavery and Sin: The Fight Against Slavery and the Rise of Liberal Protestantism, for
Journal of the Early Republic 33, no. 1 (spring 2013): 163-66.
Review of Eugene D. Genovese and Elizabeth Fox-Genovese, Fatal Self-Deception: Slaveholding
Paternalism in the Old South, for Journal of Southern History 79, no. 1 (Feb. 2013): 174-75.
The Rights of Dependents and the Wrongs of Cruelty: Animals, Children, and the Sympathetic
State, Review of Susan Pearson, The Rights of the Defenseless: Protecting Animals and Children in Gilded
Age America, for Reviews in American History 40, no. 2 (December 2012): 617-22.
Review of Jennifer Graber, The Furnace of Affliction: Prisons and Religion in Antebellum America, for
Journal of American History 98, no. 3 (Dec. 2011): 826.
Review of Alison LaCroix, The Ideological Origins of American Federalism, in The Historian 73, no. 4
(2011): 827-29.
Review of Rachel Hope Cleves, The Reign of Terror in America: Visions of Violence from Anti-Jacobinism to
Antislavery, in Journal of Southern History 76, no. 4 (November 2010): 988-89.
Review of Joyce Lee Malcolm, Peters War: A New England Slave Boy and the American Revolution, in
Journal of British Studies, 9 (January 2010): 185186.
Review of John R. Dichtl, Frontiers of Faith: Bringing Catholicism to the West in the Early Republic, in
Journal of Southern History 75, no. 4 (November 2009): 1045-46.
Review of David W. Blight, A Slave No More: Two Men Who Escaped to Freedom, Including Their Own
Narratives of Emancipation, in The History Teacher 41, no. 4 (August 2008): 551-52.
Review of Jeffrey M. Burns, San Francisco: A History of the Archdiocese of San Francisco, Catholic Southwest:
A Journal of History and Culture 11 (2000): 106-107.
SELECTED PAPERS, PRESENTATIONS, AND LECTURES
To Err is Human?: Historicizing Sin, Humanities and Divinity: Reckoning with Intellectual and
Religious History, April 25, 2015, University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, IN
Suffering Sinners: Pain, Sympathy, and the Fallen Woman, Organization of American Historians,
April 18, 2015, St. Louis, MO
Sin, Seduction, and the Victims of Vice, October 20, 2014, Hope College, Holland, MI
The Sins of Slaves and the Slaves of Sin, Moral Theology Colloquium, October 15, 2014,
University of Notre Dame
Panelist, Society for U.S. Intellectual History Annual Book Award, October 11, 2014
Panelist, Badin Bible Symposium, October 10, 2014, University of Notre Dame
Victims, Villains, and the Vocabulary of Humanitarianism, Crisis of Humanitarianism /
Humanitarianism in Crisis Conference, April 25, 2014, University of Chicago

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The Slavery of Sin and the Sins of Slavery, American Society for Church History, April 4, 2014,
Oxford, UK
A Voluntary Victim to Vice: Seduction Novels, Moral Philosophy, and the Moral Mistake,
Society for Historians of the Early American Republic, July 19-22, 2012, Baltimore, MD
True and False Philanthropy: Slavery, Moral Philosophy, and Moral Responsibility, February 24,
2012, Southern Intellectual History Circle, College of William and Mary, Williamsburg, VA
Redefining Guilt: Innocence and Transgression in Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-Century AngloAmerican Moral Philosophy, September 3, 2010, Guarding Innocence: Moral Protectionism in
Nineteenth-Century Britain and America, St. Catharines College, University of Cambridge, UK
Slavery and Feeling: The State of the Field, March 20, 2010, American Society for EighteenthCentury Studies, Albuquerque, NM
The Problem of Cruelty: Slavery, Pain, and Human Rights in Antebellum America, April 21, 2009,
Alexander F. Carson Lecture in American History, Holy Cross College, Worcester, MA
Ten Thousand Recollections, by the Blacks, of the Injuries They Have Sustained: Slavery,
Emancipation, and the Problem of Cruelty, March 5, 2009, Society of Early Americanists,
Hamilton, Bermuda
Commentator, Re-Thinking Religion, Politics, and the Second Great Awakening, January 3, 2009,
American Society for Church History Annual Meeting, New York City
Pain and Human Rights in the American Slavery Debate, February 29, 2008, Civil Rights and the
Body in the American South, Center for the Study of the American South, University of North
Carolina at Chapel Hill, NC
Freedom to Starve: Slavery and Humanitarianism, March 30, 2007, Organization of American
Historians Annual Meeting, Minneapolis, MN
Slaves, Quakers, and the Suffering People: Quaker Humanitarianism and Moral Identity, January
7, 2007, American Historical Association, Atlanta, Georgia [panelist and panel organizer]
The Cruelty of Slavery, The Cruelty of Freedom: Pain, Violence, and the American Slavery
Debate, November 16, 2006, Southern Historical Association, Birmingham, Alabama [panelist and
panel organizer]
The Happy Consciousness that his Master is His Friend: Slaveholders and the Rhetoric of
Benevolence, April 8, 2006, Virginia Forum, Shenandoah University, Winchester, VA
The Problem with Pain: Slavery, Sympathy, and Utility in Antebellum Polemics, November 2002,
Intellectual History Seminar, University of Notre Dame, IN

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SELECTED FELLOWSHIPS, GRANTS, AND HONORS

Fellowship, National Endowment for the Humanities, 2014-2015
Distinguished Fellow of the Notre Dame Institute for Advanced Study, Spring 2015
Summer Stipend, National Endowment for the Humanities, 2013
Frederick A. and Marion S. Pottle Fellowship in 18th-Century British Studies, Beinecke Rare Book
and Manuscript Library, Yale University, 2013
J. Carlyle Sitterson Visiting Scholar Grant, Southern Historical Collection, University of North
Carolina at Chapel Hill, 2013
Lapides Fellowship in Pre-1865 Juvenile Literature and Ephemera, American Antiquarian Society,
2013
Andrew W. Mellon Fellowship, Library Company of Philadelphia and Historical Society of
Pennsylvania, 2013
Cushwa Center for the Study of American Catholicism Research Travel Grant, University of Notre
Dame, 2013
Research Grants Committee Award, University of Alabama, 2011
John Highbarger Memorial Prize for the best dissertation in the History Department, University of
Notre Dame, 2006
Charlotte W. Newcombe Dissertation Fellowship, Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship
Foundation, 2004-2005
John Nicholas Brown Center for the Study of American Civilization Research Fellowship, Brown
University, 2003
Friends of the Princeton University Library Research Grant, Princeton University, 2003
Gest Research Fellowship, The Quaker Collection, Haverford College, 2003
Mellon Research Fellowship, Virginia Historical Society, 2003
Research Grant, John Hope Franklin Collection for African and African-American Documentation,
Duke University, 2003
Filson Fellowship, Filson Historical Society, 2003
Zahm Research Travel Grant, University of Notre Dame, 2003
Phi Beta Kappa, 1999
TEACHING (AT THE UNIVERSITY OF ALABAMA)
American Civilization to 1865, Undergraduate Course (200-400 students)
Fall 2006, Spring 2007, Fall 2007, Fall 2008, Fall 2009, Spring 2010, Fall 2010, Spring 2013
Honors American Civilization to 1865, Undergraduate Course
Fall 2006, Spring 2008, Spring 2010, Spring 2012
American Thought and Culture before 1860, Undergraduate Course
Fall 2007, Fall 2010, Fall 2012

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American Thought and Culture since 1860, Undergraduate Course

Spring 2009, Spring 2011
Morality and Social Change in American History, Undergraduate/Graduate Course
Undergraduate: Spring 2012, Undergraduate/Graduate: Spring 2009
American Religious History before 1870, Undergraduate/Graduate Course
Undergraduate: Spring 2010, Fall 2011, Undergraduate/Graduate: Spring 2008
Slavery, Freedom, and Authority, Undergraduate Course
Fall 2011
Sinners and Saints in American History, Undergraduate Course
Fall 2015
Undergraduate Writing Seminar: American Thought, Beliefs, and Values
Spring 2011
Literature of American History before 1865, Graduate Course
Fall 2008, Fall 2012
History Colloquium, Graduate Course
Fall 2015
SERVICE (SELECTED LIST)
External Service
2013-2015
Conference Organizer, Humanities and Divinity: Reckoning with Intellectual and
Religious History, April 23-25, 2015, University of Notre Dame
2013-2014
Annual Book Prize Committee, Society for U.S. Intellectual History
2011Southern Intellectual History Circle Program Committee Member
2010-2011
Local Coordinator for 2011 meeting of the Southern Intellectual History Circle
2012, 2009
Delegate, Phi Beta Kappa Triennial Convention
Service at the University of Alabama
2012-13, 15- History Department Graduate Committee
2011-2013
President, Phi Beta Kappa
2011-2013
College of Arts and Sciences Graduate Committee
2009Executive Committee, Phi Beta Kappa
2009
Guest Lecture, Docent Training Class, Westervelt-Warner Museum of American Art
2008-2013
History Department Textbook Committee [to ensure compliance with ethics rules
concerning authors assigning their own books]
2008-2009
History Writing Center Advisor
2007, 2011
Grants Writing Workshop for History Graduate Students
2007-2011
Multiple Presentations for Teaching American History Program: Slavery and the
Meaning of Freedom, Antebellum Reform and Utopian Communities, Political
Participation in Jacksonian America, Tuscaloosa, AL
2007-2008
Atlantic World Search Committee
2007-2013
Founder and Coordinator, University Female Faculty Group
2006Bankhead Fund Advisory Committee
2006-2007
European Military or Diplomatic History Search Committee