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About Me

Ariela Gross, whose research and writing focus on race and slavery in the United States, teaches Contracts, History of American Law, and Race and Gender in the Law.

Gross is the author of What Blood Won’t Tell: A History of Race on Trial in America, which has won several awards, including the 2009 J. Willard Hurst Prize for the best book in sociolegal history from the Law and Society Association; the 2009 Lillian Smith Book Award for the best book on the South from the Southern Regional Council; and the American Political Association’s prize for the best book on Race, Ethnicity, and Politics. Gross also is the author of Double Character: Slavery and Mastery in the Antebellum Southern Courtroom (Princeton University Press, 2000; in paperback by University of Georgia Press, 2006) and numerous law review articles and book chapters. She is the co-author of several history textbooks, including America Past & Present (Pearson Longman Pub., 8th ed. 2008).

Gross received her BA from Harvard University, her JD from Stanford Law School, and her PhD in History from Stanford University. She received a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Frederick J. Burkhardt Fellowship of the American Council of Learned Societies, and an NEH Huntington Library Long-Term Fellowship to support her research for What Blood Won’t Tell. In 2010, she was appointed a Distinguished Lecturer by the Organization of American Historians. She joined the USC gould School of Law faculty in 1996.

Recent Publications

Books

American Stories: A History of the United States, 2nd and 3rd. eds. (with William Brand, Timothy Breen, and Hal Williams) (Pearson, 2012, 2014). – (www)
America Past & Present, and The American Story, 10th ed., (with Robert Divine, William Brand, Timothy Breen, and Hal Williams) (Pearson, 2013). – (www)
What Blood Won’t Tell: A History of Race on Trial in America (Harvard University Press, 2008; ppb. 2010). (CHOICE Outstanding Academic Title, co-winner of the J. Willard Hurst Prize, the Lillian Smith Book Award, and the APSA-Race. Ethnicity & Politics Best Book Award) Reviews and interviews available on www. arielagross.com.
Double Character: Slavery and Mastery in the Antebellum Southern Courtroom (Princeton University Press, 2000; ppb. University of Georgia Press, 2006). – (www)
Articles and Book Chapters

Editor, Special Issue: “‘A Crime Against Humanity’: Slavery and The Boundaries of Legality, Past and Present,” 35 Law and History Review (2017).
“Introduction: A Crime Against Humanity: Slavery and The Boundaries of Legality, Past and Present,” 35 Law and History Review 1 (2017). – (Hein)
“The New Abolitionism, International Law, and The Memory of Slavery” (with Chantal Thomas), 35 Law and History Review 99 (2017). – (Hein)
“Boundary Crossings: Slavery and Freedom, Legality and Illegality, Past and Present” (with Alejandro de la Fuente), 35 Law and History Review 119 (2017). – (Hein)
“Article IV, Section 2” (with David R. Upham), in The Interactive Constitution, National Constitution Center (2016). – (www)
“Laws of Blood: The Invisible Common Sense of Race in U.S. Courtrooms,” in Dismantling The Race Myth 1: 139-161 (Tokyo University Press, 2016).
“On Race and Law,” in Printed_Matter: Online Journal of Centro Primo Levi (May 2015). – (www)
“Manumission and Freedom in the Americas: Cuba, Louisiana, Virginia, 1500s-1700s” (with Alejandro de la Fuente), Quaderni Storici (January 2015), pp. 15-48. – (PDF)
“Never Forget? Jewish Identity, History, Memory, Slavery, and The Constitution,” in “Symposium: People of the Book,” 16 Rutgers Journal of Law & Religion 294 (2015). – (Hein)
“Slaves, Free Blacks and Race in the Legal Regimes of Cuba, Louisiana, and Virginia: A Comparison” (with Alejandro de la Fuente), in “Symposium on Race Trials” 91 North Carolina Law Review 1699 (2013). – (Hein)
“All Born to Freedom? Comparing the Law and Politics of Race and the Memory of Slavery in the U.S. and France Today,” 21 Southern California Interdisciplinary Law Journal 523 (2012). – (Hein)
“From the Streets to the Courts: Doing Grassroots Legal History of the Civil Rights Era.” A Review of Courage to Dissent: Atlanta and the Long History of the Civil Rights Movement, by Tomiko Brown Nagin. 90 Texas Law Review 1233 (2012). – (Hein)
“Teaching Humanities Softly: Bringing A Critical Approach to the First-Year Contracts Class Through Trial and Error,” in “Symposium on Excavating and Integrating Law and Humanities in the Core Curriculum” (AALS Section on Law and Humanities Program) 3 California Law Review Circuit 19 (2012). – (www)
Unsex Parenting, or, What’s So Bad About the 1970s: A Comment on Darren Rosenblum, Unsex Mothering,” in Harvard Journal of Law & Gender, online (2012).
“Essay: Race, Law and Comparative History,” 29 Law and History Review 549 (2011). – (Hein)
“Comparative Studies of Law, Slavery, and Race in the Americas” (with Alejandro de la Fuente), 6 Annual Review of Law & Social Science 469 (2010). – (PDF)

Media Coverage

Social Media

Country Focus

Expertise by Geography

France, United States

Expertise by Chronology

19th century, 20th century, 21st century

Expertise by Topic

Law, Race, Slavery