Françoise Hamlin

“Freedom’s Cost” positions children and youth at the center of the post-World War II African American movements for civil rights by addressing activism’s personal and communal costs. Blending civil rights movement histories with the burgeoning fields in trauma studies, the project adds dimension to the heroic narrative, exposing complicated and long-term realities for many young people. It involves a rethinking of activism, mental health, and loss, through the interdisciplinary lenses of race, childhood studies, trauma studies, psychology, and memory. The project extends civil rights and, more broadly, US historiography, revealing the challenges of movement-building, while celebrating those who sacrificed so much in the pursuit of freedom and justice.