Blacks in the Diaspora – serie

Creolizing the Metropole is a comparative study of postwar West Indian migration to the former colonial capitals of Paris and London. It studies the effects of this population shift on national and cultural identity and traces the postcolonial Caribbean experience through analyses of the concepts of identity and diaspora. Through close readings of selected literary works and film, H. Adlai Murdoch explores the ways in which these immigrants and their descendants represented their metropolitan identities. Though British immigrants were colonial subjects and, later, residents of British Commonwealth nations, and the French arrivals from the overseas departments were citizens of France by law, both groups became subject to otherness and exclusion stemming from their ethnicities. Murdoch examines this phenomenon and the questions it raises about borders and boundaries, nationality and belonging.

In this volume, Lovalerie King and Shirley Moody-Turner have compiled a collection of essays that offer access to some of the most innovative contemporary black fiction while addressing important issues in current African American literary studies. Distinguished scholars Houston Baker, Trudier Harris, Darryl Dickson-Carr, and Maryemma Graham join writers and younger scholars to explore the work of Toni Morrison, Edward P. Jones, Trey Ellis, Paul Beatty, Mat Johnson, Kyle Baker, Danzy Senna, Nikki Turner, and many others. The collection is bracketed by a foreword by novelist and graphic artist Mat Johnson, one of the most exciting and innovative contemporary African American writers, and an afterword by Alice Randall, author of the controversial parody The Wind Done Gone. Together, King and Moody-Turner make the case that diversity, innovation, and canon expansion are essential to maintaining the vitality of African American literary studies.

In this volume, Lovalerie King and Shirley Moody-Turner have compiled a collection of essays that offer access to some of the most innovative contemporary black fiction while addressing important issues in current African American literary studies. Distinguished scholars Houston Baker, Trudier Harris, Darryl Dickson-Carr, and Maryemma Graham join writers and younger scholars to explore the work of Toni Morrison, Edward P. Jones, Trey Ellis, Paul Beatty, Mat Johnson, Kyle Baker, Danzy Senna, Nikki Turner, and many others. The collection is bracketed by a foreword by novelist and graphic artist Mat Johnson, one of the most exciting and innovative contemporary African American writers, and an afterword by Alice Randall, author of the controversial parody The Wind Done Gone. Together, King and Moody-Turner make the case that diversity, innovation, and canon expansion are essential to maintaining the vitality of African American literary studies.

In Free and French in the Caribbean, John Patrick Walsh studies the writings of Toussaint Louverture and Aimé Césaire to examine how they conceived of and narrated two defining events in the decolonializing of the French Caribbean: the revolution that freed the French colony of Saint-Domingue in 1803 and the departmentalization of Martinique and other French colonies in 1946. Walsh emphasizes the connections between these events and the distinct legacies of emancipation in the narratives of revolution and nationhood passed on to successive generations. By reexamining Louverture and Césaire in light of their multilayered narratives, the book offers a deeper understanding of the historical and contemporary phenomenon of "free and French" in the Caribbean.

In a speech from which Nation of Cowards derives its title, Attorney General Eric Holder argued forcefully that Americans today need to talk more—not less—about racism. This appeal for candid talk about race exposes the paradox of Barack Obama's historic rise to the US presidency and the ever-increasing social and economic instability of African American communities. David H. Ikard and Martell Lee Teasley maintain that such a conversation can take place only with passionate and organized pressure from black Americans, and that neither Obama nor any political figure is likely to be in the forefront of addressing issues of racial inequality and injustice. The authors caution blacks not to slip into an accommodating and self-defeating "post-racial" political posture, settling for the symbolic capital of a black president instead of demanding structural change. They urge the black community to challenge the social terms on which it copes with oppression, including acts of self-imposed victimization.

In Free and French in the Caribbean, John Patrick Walsh studies the writings of Toussaint Louverture and Aimé Césaire to examine how they conceived of and narrated two defining events in the decolonializing of the French Caribbean: the revolution that freed the French colony of Saint-Domingue in 1803 and the departmentalization of Martinique and other French colonies in 1946. Walsh emphasizes the connections between these events and the distinct legacies of emancipation in the narratives of revolution and nationhood passed on to successive generations. By reexamining Louverture and Césaire in light of their multilayered narratives, the book offers a deeper understanding of the historical and contemporary phenomenon of "free and French" in the Caribbean.

Legacy of the Lash is a compelling social and cultural history of the Brazilian navy in the decades preceding and immediately following the 1888 abolition of slavery in Brazil. Focusing on non-elite, mostly black enlisted men and the oppressive labor regimes under which they struggled, the book is an examination of the four-day Revolta da Chibata (Revolt of the Lash) of November 1910, during which nearly half of Rio de Janeiro's enlisted men rebelled against the use of corporal punishment in the navy. These men seized four new, powerful warships, turned their guns on Rio de Janeiro, Brazil's capital city, and held its population hostage until the government abolished the use of the lash as a means of military discipline. Although the revolt succeeded, the men involved paid dearly for their actions. This event provides a clear lens through which to examine racial identity, violence, masculinity, citizenship, modernity, and the construction of the Brazilian nation.

Mangrove rice farming on West Africa's Rice Coast was the mirror image of tidewater rice plantations worked by enslaved Africans in 18th-century South Carolina and Georgia. This book reconstructs the development of rice-growing technology among the Baga and Nalu of coastal Guinea, beginning more than a millennium before the transatlantic slave trade. It reveals a picture of dynamic pre-colonial coastal societies, quite unlike the static, homogenous pre-modern Africa of previous scholarship. From its examination of inheritance, innovation, and borrowing, Deep Roots fashions a theory of cultural change that encompasses the diversity of communities, cultures, and forms of expression in Africa and the African diaspora.

Since the 19th century, assertions of a common, racially-mixed Cuban identity based on acceptance of African descent have challenged the view of Cubans as racially white. For the past two centuries, these competing views of Cuban racial identity have remained in continuous tension, while Cuban women and men make their own racially oriented choices in family formation. Cuba's Racial Crucible explores the historical dynamics of Cuban race relations by highlighting the racially selective reproductive practices and genealogical memories associated with family formation. Karen Y. Morrison reads archival, oral-history, and literary sources to demonstrate the ideological centrality and inseparability of "race," "nation," and "family," in definitions of Cuban identity. Morrison analyzes the conditions that supported the social advance and decline of notions of white racial superiority, nationalist projections of racial hybridity, and pride in African descent.

Since the 19th century, assertions of a common, racially-mixed Cuban identity based on acceptance of African descent have challenged the view of Cubans as racially white. For the past two centuries, these competing views of Cuban racial identity have remained in continuous tension, while Cuban women and men make their own racially oriented choices in family formation. Cuba's Racial Crucible explores the historical dynamics of Cuban race relations by highlighting the racially selective reproductive practices and genealogical memories associated with family formation. Karen Y. Morrison reads archival, oral-history, and literary sources to demonstrate the ideological centrality and inseparability of "race," "nation," and "family," in definitions of Cuban identity. Morrison analyzes the conditions that supported the social advance and decline of notions of white racial superiority, nationalist projections of racial hybridity, and pride in African descent.

By exploring the complexities of enslavement in the autobiography of Cuban slave-poet Juan Francisco Manzano (1797–1854), Gerard Aching complicates the universally recognized assumption that a slave's foremost desire is to be freed from bondage. As the only slave narrative in Spanish that has surfaced to date, Manzano's autobiography details the daily grind of the vast majority of slaves who sought relief from the burden of living under slavery. Aching combines historical narrative and literary criticism to take the reader beyond Manzano's text to examine the motivations behind anticolonial and antislavery activism in pre-revolution Cuba, when Cuba's Creole bourgeoisie sought their own form of freedom from the colonial arm of Spain.

Although they came from distinct polities and peoples who spoke different languages, slaves from the African Gold Coast were collectively identified by Europeans as "Coromantee" or "Mina." Why these ethnic labels were embraced and how they were utilized by enslaved Africans to develop new group identities is the subject of Walter C. Rucker's absorbing study. Rucker examines the social and political factors that contributed to the creation of New World ethnic identities and assesses the ways displaced Gold Coast Africans used familiar ideas about power as a means of understanding, defining, and resisting oppression. He explains how performing Coromantee and Mina identity involved a common set of concerns and the creation of the ideological weapons necessary to resist the slavocracy. These weapons included obeah powders, charms, and potions; the evolution of "peasant" consciousness and the ennoblement of common people; increasingly aggressive displays of masculinity; and the empowerment of women as leaders, spiritualists, and warriors, all of which marked sharp breaks or reformulations of patterns in their Gold Coast past.

What effect has the black literary imagination attempted to have on, in Toni Morrison's words, "a race of readers that understands itself to be 'universal' or race-free"? How has black literature challenged the notion that reading is a race-neutral act? Race and the Literary Encounter takes as its focus several modern and contemporary African American narratives that not only narrate scenes of reading but also attempt to intervene in them. The texts interrupt, manage, and manipulate, employing thematic, formal, and performative strategies in order to multiply meanings for multiple readers, teach new ways of reading, and enable the emergence of antiracist reading subjects. Analyzing works by James Weldon Johnson, Zora Neale Hurston, Ralph Ellison, Jamaica Kincaid, Percival Everett, Sapphire, and Toni Morrison, Lesley Larkin covers a century of African American literature in search of the concepts and strategies that black writers have developed in order to address and theorize a diverse audience, and outlines the special contributions modern and contemporary African American literature makes to the fields of reader ethics and antiracist literary pedagogy.

What effect has the black literary imagination attempted to have on, in Toni Morrison's words, "a race of readers that understands itself to be 'universal' or race-free"? How has black literature challenged the notion that reading is a race-neutral act? Race and the Literary Encounter takes as its focus several modern and contemporary African American narratives that not only narrate scenes of reading but also attempt to intervene in them. The texts interrupt, manage, and manipulate, employing thematic, formal, and performative strategies in order to multiply meanings for multiple readers, teach new ways of reading, and enable the emergence of antiracist reading subjects. Analyzing works by James Weldon Johnson, Zora Neale Hurston, Ralph Ellison, Jamaica Kincaid, Percival Everett, Sapphire, and Toni Morrison, Lesley Larkin covers a century of African American literature in search of the concepts and strategies that black writers have developed in order to address and theorize a diverse audience, and outlines the special contributions modern and contemporary African American literature makes to the fields of reader ethics and antiracist literary pedagogy.

Race, Class, and the Civil Rights Movement is a unique sociohistorical analysis of the civil rights movement. In it, Jack M. Bloom analyzes the interaction between the economy and political systems in the South, which led to racial stratification.Praise for the first edition:"A unique sociohistorical analysis of the civil rights movement, analyzing the interaction between the economy and political systems in the South, which led to racial stratification. An intriguing look at the interplay of race and class, this work is both scholarly and jargon-free. A sophisticated study."–Library Journal"This is an exciting book combining dramatic episodes with an insightful analysis.The use of concepts of class is subtle and effective."  –Peter N. Stearns"Ambitious and wide-ranging." –Georgia Historical Quarterly"Excellent historical analysis." –North Carolina Historical Review"Historians should welcome this book. A well-written, jargon-free interpretive synthesis, it relates impersonal political-economic forces to the human actors who were shaped by them and, in turn, helped shape them . . . . This refreshing study reminds us how much the American dilemma of race has been complicated by problems of class." –American Historical Review"A broad historical sweep . . . . Skillfully surveys key areas of historiographical debate and succinctly summarizes a good deal of recent secondary literature."  –Journal of Southern History"Bloom does a masterful job of presenting the major structural and psychological interpretations associated with the Civil Rights Movement. . . . It will make an excellent general text to welcome undergraduates and reintroduce old-timers to the social ferment that surrounded the civil rights movement." –Contemporary Sociology

Race, Class, and the Civil Rights Movement is a unique sociohistorical analysis of the civil rights movement. In it, Jack M. Bloom analyzes the interaction between the economy and political systems in the South, which led to racial stratification.Praise for the first edition:"A unique sociohistorical analysis of the civil rights movement, analyzing the interaction between the economy and political systems in the South, which led to racial stratification. An intriguing look at the interplay of race and class, this work is both scholarly and jargon-free. A sophisticated study."–Library Journal"This is an exciting book combining dramatic episodes with an insightful analysis.The use of concepts of class is subtle and effective."  –Peter N. Stearns"Ambitious and wide-ranging." –Georgia Historical Quarterly"Excellent historical analysis." –North Carolina Historical Review"Historians should welcome this book. A well-written, jargon-free interpretive synthesis, it relates impersonal political-economic forces to the human actors who were shaped by them and, in turn, helped shape them . . . . This refreshing study reminds us how much the American dilemma of race has been complicated by problems of class." –American Historical Review"A broad historical sweep . . . . Skillfully surveys key areas of historiographical debate and succinctly summarizes a good deal of recent secondary literature."  –Journal of Southern History"Bloom does a masterful job of presenting the major structural and psychological interpretations associated with the Civil Rights Movement. . . . It will make an excellent general text to welcome undergraduates and reintroduce old-timers to the social ferment that surrounded the civil rights movement." –Contemporary Sociology

" . . . absorbing biographical study . . . " —Black Enterprise"Meticulously researched and thoroughly engaging . . . " —Tulsa Studies in Women's Literature" . . . a splendid study . . . excellent . . . " —Choice"Color, Sex, and Poetry provides both the bread and the meat of critical analysis and exploration of the lives of three Black women writers." —Belles Lettres" . . . Hull succeeds not only in exploring writers whose work is hampered by their 'split authorial personalities' but also in outlining the effects of economic circumstances on literary production." —SignsA biographical/critical study of three Harlem Renaissance poets—Angelina Weld Grimké, Alice Dunbar-Nelson, and Georgia Douglas Johnson—during a rich and colorful period. Writing from a black feminist critical perspective, Hull recovers these black foremothers and in the process shakes up the traditional black literary canon.

" . . . enthusiastic, well-written . . . read it if you want to be inspired by a truly heroic woman." —New Directions for Women" . . . the fullest account to date of Stewart's life and an excellent basis for understanding Stewart's work." —History"This is informative and inspiring source material for today's scholars, lay readers, and 'professionals' . . . " —Journal of American HistoryIn gathering and introducing Stewart's works, Richardson provides an opportunity for readers to study the thoughts and words of this influential early black female activist, a forerunner to Frederick Douglass and Sojourner Truth and the first black American to lecture in defense of women's rights, placing her in the context of the swirling abolitionist movement.

"Fine reading and a superb resource." —Ms."Highly recommended." —Library Journal"Perkins has chosen the plays well, and her issue-oriented introduction places the women and their works in a literary and historical context." —Choice"As well as being centered on the black experience, the plays in Black Female Playwrights are centered on the female experience." —Voice Literary Supplement"Perkins' anthology is valuable for a number of reasons . . . Perkins' book (which includes a bibliography of plays and pageants by black women before 1950 as well as a selected bibliography of critical works) is a major help in providing access to [the world of black drama]." —Theatre JournalThe need to acknowledge these works was the impetus behind this volume. Perkins has selected nineteen plays from seven writers who were among the major dramatizers of the black experience during this early period. As forerunners to the activist black theater of the 1950s and 1960s, these plays represent a critical stage in the development of black drama in the United States.

Six independent African American filmmakers, including Charles Burnett, director of the film To Sleep with Anger, are represented in this collection by screenplays produced from 1973 to 1989. They speak in their own voice, a black voice which has resisted the cultural dominance of Hollywood. Phyllis Rauch Klotman introduces each screenplay provides a biographical sketch of the filmmaker, and lists the casts and production credits for each film: Ganja and Hess, Killer of Sheep, Losing Ground, Illusions, A Different Image, and Sidewalk Stories.

"The essays collected in this book represent the best of our present understanding of the African-American migration which began in the early twentieth century." —Southern Historian"As an overview of a field in transition, this is a valuable and deeply thought-provoking anthology." —Pennsylvania History" . . . provocative and informative . . . " —Louisiana History"The papers themselves are uniformly strong, and read together cast interesting light upon one another." —Georgia Historical Quarterly" . . . well-written and insightful essays . . . " —Journal of American History"This well-researched and well-documented collection represents the latest scholarship on the black migration." —Illinois Historical Journal" . . . an impressive balance of theory and historical content . . . " —Indiana Magazine of HistoryLegions of black Americans left the South to migrate to the jobs of the North, from the meat-packing plants of Chicago to the shipyards of Richmond, California. These essays analyze the role of African Americans in shaping their own geographical movement, emphasizing the role of black kin, friend, and communal network. Contributors include Darlene Clark Hine, Peter Gottlieb, James R. Grossman, Earl Lewis, Shirley Ann Moore, and Joe William Trotter, Jr.

"Manthia Diawara is quite simply the best critic (in any language) currently writing on African cinema." —Robert Stam"Diawara has produced a useful history, a cogent analysis, and, in his arguments on how African cinema should develop, an undoubtedly controversial book." —Studies in Popular Culture"This is a good, solid and reliable history of filmmaking on the African continent, beginning with colonial production and moving on to independent filmmaking . . . an important and welcome reference source." —Classic Images"Diawara's work is comprehensive, based on rigorous research and sound analyses . . . it aptly illustrates the intricate correlations between politics, economics and culture." —Black Film Review"In a relatively new field of historical 'film theory', African Cinema: Politics and Culture will become indispensable." —The Year's Work in Critical and Cultural Theory, Vol. 1-3, 1996Drawing on political science, economics, history, and cultural studies, Diawara provides an insider's account of the development and current status of African cinema. He discusses such issues as film production and distribution, and film aesthetics from the colonial period to the present.

"Wilentz . . . makes convincing arguments for the connections between African and Afro-American women's culture." —Nellie McKay"Wilentz's jargon-free, intelligent discussion . . . will appeal to students in African, African American, and women's literature courses, as well as general readers interested in the emerging field." —Choice"Through these works, Wilentz demonstrates the powerful transformation possible through understanding—and embracing—the past, even if that past includes oppression and brutalization." —Belles LettresBinding Cultures investigates the cultural bonds between African and African-American women writers such as Nigerian Flora Nwapa and Ghanaians Efua Sutherland and Ama Ata Aidoo, writers who focus on the role of women in passing on cultural values to future generations, and African-American writers Alice Walker, Toni Morrison, and Paule Marshall, who self-consciously evoke African culture to help create a more integrated African-American community.

"[This] critical edition of a selection of Richard B. Moore's essays closes one more gap in the astonishing history of twentieth-century Afro-American nationalism." —Journal of American History"This first collection of Moore's writings . . . [is] a welcome and important contribution to scholarship concerned with the political and intellectual history of African peoples in general and of African peoples in the Americas, in particular. . . . an inspiration to those who follow after to study and emulate his life and achievement." —Journal of American Ethnic History

"H[starred review] Powerful and rich, this outstanding contribution to theater arts is recommended for contemporary literature and black studies collections." —Library JournalEdited by award-winning U.S. playwright William Branch, this is a landmark collection of plays addressing various aspects of the global black experience by outstanding black playwrights from Africa, Europe, the Caribbean, and North and South America. Among the plays are dramas by Nobel laureates Derek Walcott and Wole Soyinka, pioneering folklorist Efua Sutherland, and two-time Pulitzer prize winner August Wilson.

"[Women in the Civil Rights Movement] helps break the gender line that restricted women in civil rights history to background and backstage roles, and places them in front, behind, and in the middle of the Southern movement that re-made America. . . . It is an invaluable resource which helps set history straight." —Julian Bond" . . . remains one of the best single sources currently available on the unique contributions of Black women in the desegregation movement." —Manning MarableRewrites the history of the civil rights movement, recognizing the contributions of Black women.

Using dance anthropology to illuminate the values and attitudes embodied in rumba, Yvonne Daniel explores the surprising relationship between dance and the profound, complex changes in contemporary Cuba.From the barrio and streets to the theatre and stage, rumba has emerged as an important medium, contributing to national goals, reinforcing Caribbean solidarity, and promoting international prestige. Since the Revolution of 1959, rumba has celebrated national identity and cultural heritage, and embodied an official commitment to new values. Once a lower-class recreational dance, rumba has become a symbol of egalitarian efforts in postrevolutionary Cuba. The professionalization of performers, organization of performance spaces, and proliferation of performance opportunities have prompted new paradigms and altered previous understandings of rumba.

"Clear, concise, and filled with new materials, the book sets a high standard . . . Scholars in African American, police, and urban history will all be grateful for what is certain to become a fundamental work in their fields." —The Alabama Review"A balanced, perceptive, and readable study." —Kirkus Reviews" . . . easily read and interesting text . . . " —The Post and Courier (Charleston, SC)"[This] readable book is bound to explode plenty of myths. . . . This is an important book that is long overdue." —Our Texas, The Spirit of African-American Heritage"There is no better time than now for this electrifying, clear, and much needed volume." —Robert B. Ingram, President, National Conference of Black Mayors"Black Police in America is the most comprehensive and best documented study that I have read on African Americans in law enforcement." —Nudie Eugene Williams, University of Arkansas"Full of fascinating stories and accounts of racism and heroism, as well as photos and charts, this volume fills a void in the study of the African-American experience." —South Carolina Historical Magazine". . . a fresh and original study and an important contribution to the fields of African American and urban history and criminal justice." —The Journal of American History" . . . an accomplished and wide-ranging comparative analysis of the role of race in the development and operation of police departments in America's nineteenth- and twentieth-century cities." —The Journal of Southern HistoryAfrican Americans demanded "colored police for colored people" for over two centuries. Black Police in America traces the history of African Americans in policing, from the appointment of the first "free men of color" as slave patrollers in 19th-century New Orleans to the advent of black police chiefs in urban centers—and explains the impact of black police officers on race relations, law enforcement, and crime.

". . . a much-needed volume on a neglected topic that is of great interest to scholars of women, slavery, and African American history." —Drew FaustGender was a decisive force in shaping slave society. Slave men's experiences differed from those of slave women, who were exploited both in reproductive as well as productive capacities. The women did not figure prominently in revolts, because they engaged in less confrontational resistance, emphasizing creative struggle to survive dehumanization and abuse.The contributors are Hilary Beckles, Barbara Bush, Cheryl Ann Cody, David Barry Gaspar, David P. Geggus, Virginia Meacham Gould, Mary Karasch, Wilma King, Bernard Moitt, Celia E. Naylor-Ojurongbe, Robert A. Olwell, Claire Robertson, Robert W. Slenes, Susan M. Socolow, Richard H. Steckel, and Brenda E. Stevenson.