JCB Reads: Katherine Johnston's The Nature of Slavery: Environment and Plantation Labor in the Anglo-Atlantic World

Launched during the 2024-5 academic year, JCB Reads offers former JCB fellows the opportunity to share their recent book publications. These online events are open to anyone who is interested. 

Join us on Monday, November 3, 2025 at noon for a virtual discussion of The Nature of Slavery: Environment and Plantation Labor in the Anglo-Atlantic World by Katherine Johnston (Montana State University). 

About the book

"Katherine Johnston's The Nature of Slavery is a superb contribution to a growing literature on the history of race, medicine, environments, and slavery. Carefully researched and thoughtfully argued, the book unsettles basic assumptions about the origins of ideas about 'biological' race. It will be a must-read for years to come." -- Suman Seth, author of Difference and Disease: Medicine, Race, and Locality in the Eighteenth-Century British Empire

Read more about Professor Johnston's book here.