The Earliest African American Literatures - by Zachary McLeod Hutchins & Cassander L Smith Paperback

About the Book

"With the publication of the 1619 Project by The New York Times in 2019, a growing number of Americans have become aware that Africans arrived in North America before the Pilgrims. Yet the stories of these Africans and their first descendants remain ephemeral and inaccessible for both the general public and educators. This groundbreaking collection of thirty-eight biographical and autobiographical texts chronicles the lives of literary black Africans in British colonial America from 1643 to 1760 and offers new strategies for identifying and interpreting the presence of black Africans in this early period"--

Book Synopsis

With the publication of the 1619 Project by The New York Times in 2019, a growing number of Americans have become aware that Africans arrived in North America before the Pilgrims. Yet the stories of these Africans and their first descendants remain ephemeral and inaccessible for both the general public and educators. This groundbreaking collection of thirty-eight biographical and autobiographical texts chronicles the lives of literary black Africans in British colonial America from 1643 to 1760 and offers new strategies for identifying and interpreting the presence of black Africans in this early period. Brief introductions preceding each text provide historical context and genre-specific interpretive prompts to foreground their significance. Included here are transcriptions from manuscript sources and colonial newspapers as well as forgotten texts. The Earliest African American Literatures will change the way that students and scholars conceive of early American literature and the role of black Africans in the formation of that literature.

Review Quotes

"Professors Zachary McLeod Hutchins and Cassander L. Smith have offered students, teachers, and researchers a new model for meaning-making and archival studies with their book The Earliest African American Literatures: A Critical Reader. . . . It is impossible to overemphasize the thoughtful preparation and organization of The Earliest African American Literatures: A Critical Reader. . . . It presents a new, accessible method of thinking about reading and compositional practices during the colonial period without compromising the complexities of documentary research, the colonial period, or the black African literary lives to which The Earliest African American Literatures: A Critical Reader gives voice."--Early American Literature

About the Author

Zachary McLeod Hutchins is associate professor of English at Colorado State University.

Cassander L. Smith is associate professor of English at the University of Alabama.