A portrait of nineteenth-century conjoined twins Chang and Eng Bunker describes their rise from savvy side-show celebrities to wealthy Southern gentry and discusses how their experiences reflected America's historical penchant for objectifying differences.

A portrait of Chang and Eng Bunker, twins conjoined at the sternum by a band of cartilage and a fused liver, who were 'discovered' in Siam in 1824. Their rise from subhuman, freak-show celebrities to rich southern gentry; their marriage to two white sisters, resulting in 21 children; and their owning of slaves, is a Hawthorne-like excavation of America's historical penchant for the abnormal, for tyrannizing the 'other', a tradition that becomes inseparable from American history itself.