African American Literature in Transition, 1750-1800: Volume 1

Rhondda Robinson Thomas is the Calhoun Lemon Professor of Literature at Clemson University specializing in early African American literature. She is the author of Claiming Exodus: A Cultural History of Afro-Atlantic Identity, 1770-1903 (2013). Her essays have appeared in African American Review, American Literary History, and the Oxford Handbook of the African American Slave Narrative. She is a member of the Society of Early Americanists.

'… Thomas's volume offers sharply focused insights into the development of Black literary consciousness in the early days of African America.' Amadi Iruka Ozier, Early American Literature

• Introduction: Impatient of oppression in early African American writing in transition Rhondda Robinson Thomas; Part I. Limits and Liberties of Early Black Print Culture: 1. Early black evangelical writing and the radical limitations of print Joseph Rezek; 2. The circulation of early black Atlantic literature Eric D. Lamore; 3. What makes a text 'Black'? from authorship to metadata Jordan Alexander Stein; Part II. Black Writing and Revolution: 4. African Americans writing themselves into history during the age of revolution Daniel C. Littlefield; 5. African American writing in the era of independence Thomas J. Davis; 6. Black literary engagement with the Haitian revolution Ronald Angelo Johnson; Part III. Early African American Life in Literature: 7. Reading and building a Nation; or everyday living (while Black) in early America Tara Bynum; 8. Respectability politics and early African American literature Cassander L. Smith; 9. Early black futures Brigitte Fielder; Part IV. Evolutions of Early Black Literature: 10. Black authors and British National identity, 1763-1791 Ryan Hanley; 11. The competing demands of early African American literature, 1783-1798 Katy L. Chiles; 12. Black letters close the eighteenth century John Saillant; Bibliography.