Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States from Interviews with Former Slaves, Volume II, Arkansas Narratives, Part 7

by United States. Work Projects Administration

"Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States from…" is a collection of oral histories compiled between 1936 and 1938 by the Federal Writers' Project. More than 2,000 interviews with formerly enslaved individuals were conducted across seventeen states, preserving their memories before they were lost. However, the collection remains controversial: mostly white interviewers documented these stories during Jim Crow, raising questions about bias and how interviewees shaped their accounts under such circumstances. The narratives offer invaluable yet complicated testimony about slavery's legacy.