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In this lecture, Carolyn Eastman, Ph.D., reexamines the Declaration of Independence in the context of the political, cultural, and social forces shaping the revolutionary moment. From the influence of Thomas Paine’s Common Sense to debates over slavery, religion, and relationships with Native nations, this session challenges common myths and offers a deeper understanding of the document’s origins and impact.

About the speaker

Carolyn Eastman (Ph.D., Johns Hopkins University) is a professor in the Department of History in the College of Humanities and Sciences at Virginia Commonwealth University. She is a scholar of early America and the Atlantic world and serves as president of the Society for Historians of the Early American Republic. She is the author of the prizewinning "A Nation of Speechifiers: Making an American Public after the Revolution" (University of Chicago Press). Her book "The Strange Genius of Mr. O: The World of the United States’ First Forgotten Celebrity" (University of North Carolina Press) received the 2021 James Bradford Best Biography Prize and the 2022 Library of Virginia Literary Award for Nonfiction. She is currently developing a new book on New York’s yellow fever epidemics during the founding era.