The next installment of Fireside Chats at West VirginiaUniversity will be at 4 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 9, when doctoral history student Katharine Antolini presents”Negotiating Motherhood in the Antebellum South”in the Betty Boyd Lounge of Elizabeth Moore Hall.

The presentation will discuss how slaveholding women and slave women adapted motherhood during the practice of slavery.

Antolini is a graduate student pursuing a doctorate in history with an academic focus on 19th century American gender history. Her focus includes the history of motherhood and how motherhood has shaped the lives of women.

According to Antolini, the antebellum South presented groups of women with vastly different opportunities and challenges of maintaining their identities as mothers. Although plantation mistresses and slave women shared in the biological”destiny”of motherhood, the negotiation of maternal commitment reflected the inequalities of race and class in southern society.

Antolini received a masters degree in history/public history from WVU and a masters in sociology from RutgersUniversity. She is currently a graduate instructor at WVU and a historical interpreter of 18th and 19th century American history for the Pricketts Fort Memorial Foundation.

The discussion is part of an annual Fireside Chat series hosted by the WVUCenter for Womens Studies. The next Fireside Chat,”Women as Perpetrators of Violence,”takes place on Oct. 23.

Wednesdays presentation is sponsored by the WVUCenter for Womens Studies and made possible through the contributions to the Womens Studies Development Fund.

The event is free and open to the public. Refreshments will be provided. For more information, call 304-293-2339.