Wilbur Cross – författare

In 1989, 1998, and 2005, fifteen Gullah speakers went to Sierra Leone and other parts of West Africa to trace their origins and ancestry. Their journey frames this exploration of the extraordinary history of the Gullah culture-characterized by strong African cultural retention and a direct influence on American culture, particularly in the South-described in this fascinating book. Since long before the Revolution, America has had hidden pockets of a bygone African culture with a language of its own, and long endowed with traditions, language, design, medicine, agriculture, fishing, hunting, weaving, and the arts. This book explores the Gullah culture's direct link to Africa, via the sea islands of the American southeast.The first published evidence of Gullah went almost unrecorded until the 1860s, when missionaries from Philadelphia made their way, even as the Civil War was at its height, to St. Helena Island, South Carolina, to establish a small institution called Penn School to help freed slaves learn how to read and write and make a living in a world of upheaval and distress. There they noticed that most of the islanders spoke a language that was only part English, tempered with expressions and idioms, often spoken in a melodious, euphonic manner, accompanied by distinctive practices in religion, work, dancing, greetings, and the arts. The homogeneity, richness, and consistency of this culture was possible because the sea-islanders were isolated. Even today, there are more than 300,000 Gullah people, many of whom speak little or no English, living in the remoter areas of the sea islands of St. Helena, Edisto, Coosay, Ossabaw, Sapelo, Daufuskie, and Cumberland. Gullah Culture in America explores not only the history of Gullah, but takes the reader behind the scenes of Gullah culture today to show what it's like to grow up, live, and celebrate in this remarkable and uniquely American community.

The Gullah people of St. Helena Island still relate that their people wanted to “catch the learning” after northern abolitionists founded Penn School in 1862, less than six months after the Union army captured the South Carolina sea islands. In this broad history Orville Vernon Burton and Wilbur Cross range across the past 150 years to reacquaint us with the far-reaching impact of a place where many daring and innovative social justice endeavors had their beginnings.Penn Center’s earliest incarnation was as a refuge where escaped and liberated enslaved people could obtain formal liberal arts schooling, even as the Civil War raged on sometimes just miles away. Penn Center then earned a place in the history of education by providing agricultural and industrial arts training for African Americans after Reconstruction and through the Jim Crow era, the Great Depression, and two world wars. Later, during the civil rights movement, Penn Center made history as a safe meeting place for organizations like Martin Luther King Jr.’s Southern Christian Leadership Conference and the Peace Corps. Today, Penn Center continues to build on its long tradition of leadership in progressive causes. As a social services hub for local residents and as a museum, conference, and education complex, Penn Center is a showcase for activism in such areas as cultural, material, and environmental preservation; economic sustainability; and access to health care and early learning.Here is all of Penn Center’s rich past and present, as told through the experiences of its longtime Gullah inhabitants and countless visitors. Including forty-two extraordinary photographs that show Penn as it was and is now, this book recounts Penn Center's many achievements and its many challenges, reflected in the momentous events it both experienced and helped to shape.