The network has seven main objectives:
- To facilitate communication among scholars working on the history and representation of motherhood, childlessness and the care of children across Atlantic societies, producing organic links among scholars that will be self-sustaining after the end of the network.
- To develop future plans for research led by the core members of the network including collaborative projects between the UK and Brazil.
- To support and mentor PhD students and early career scholars working on relevant questions, by enabling them to meet and to present their research to an international group of scholars in the field.
- To share findings and stimulate debate about a set of research questions, oriented to the larger question ‘how similar was the experience of motherhood, the care of children, and childlessness across Atlantic slave societies, and what were the important differences?’
- Once having started answering these questions, we intend to publish a special issue of the journal Slavery and Abolition on the network’s themes, including specific papers and an extended comparative introduction. The special issue will be published after the network events have taken place.
- To make research on the network’s questions available to a public and professional audience, through a website, articles in media aimed at health professionals, and public events (filmed and to be made available on the website).
- To foster links between academics, a public audience, and local history and culture groups.
This site is no longer being maintained.