Maroons And The Marooned

Contributions by Richard Bodek, Claire P. Curtis, Joseph Kelly, Simon Lewis, Steve Mentz, J. Brent Morris, Peter Sands, Edward Shore, and James O'Neil Spady Commonly, the word maroon refers to someone cast away on an island. One becomes marooned, usually, through a storm at sea or by a captain as a method of punishment. But the term originally denoted escaped slaves. Though being marooned came to be associated mostly with white European castaways, the etymology invites comparison between true maroons (escaped slaves establishing new lives in the wilderness) and people who were marooned (through maritime disaster). This volume brings together literary scholars with historians, encompassing both literal maroons such as in Brazil and South Carolina as well as metaphoric scenarios in time-travel novels and postapocalyptic narratives. Included are examples from The Tempest; Margaret Atwood’s MaddAddam trilogy; A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court; and Octavia Butler’s Kindred. Both runaways and castaways formed new societies in the wilderness. But true maroons, escaped slaves, were not cast away; they chose to fly towards the uncertainties of the wild in pursuit of freedom. In effect, this volume gives these maroons proper credit, at the very heart of American history.

Kwabena Bene, the gallant warrior, finds himself among the hundreds of Maroons dumped unceremoniously by the Governor of Jamaica in Nova Scotia, British North America, in 1796.A hero of the just-ended conflict with the British Militia in Cudjoe Town, Jamaica, Kwabena refuses to call Halifax home. He must lead the battle to be sent back to the rolling hills of Jamaica, to rejoin his people and to continue their struggle against colonial oppression.Kwabena begins a resistance on all fronts. The British on one hand, a rival Maroon leader on the other, and two women, who're caught in the middle. It doesn't take him long to realize this is no ordinary fight. It's a fight for his reputation as a warrior, a leader; a fight for trust, a fight for honor. When betrayal rears its ugly head and his mission seems destined to fail, Kwabena must prove that not even iron bars can stop him from returning to Jamaica. As the mission comes under scrutiny, the daring warrior discovers he's sinking deeper and deeper into a sea of despair that not even his enemies would want him to be. Kwabena Bene despises failure!

A provocative juxtaposition of escaped slaves and the shipwrecked across the Americas

For readers of Nathaniel Philbrick's Mayflower, a groundbreaking history that makes the case for replacing Plymouth Rock with Jamestown as America's founding myth. We all know the great American origin story: It begins with an exodus. Fleeing religious persecution, the hardworking, pious Pilgrims thrived in the wilds of New England, where they built their fabled “shining city on a hill.” Legend goes that the colony in Jamestown was a false start, offering a cautionary tale of lazy louts hunted gold till they starved and shiftless settlers who had to be rescued by English food and the hard discipline of martial law. Neither story is true. In Marooned, Joseph Kelly re-examines the history of Jamestown and comes to a radically different and decidedly American interpretation of these first Virginians. In this gripping account of shipwrecks and mutiny in America's earliest settlements, Kelly argues that the colonists at Jamestown were literally and figuratively marooned, cut loose from civilization, and cast into the wilderness. The British caste system meant little on this frontier: those who wanted to survive had to learn to work and fight and intermingle with the nearby native populations. Ten years before the Mayflower Compact and decades before Hobbes and Locke, they invented the idea of government by the people. 150 years before Jefferson, the colonists discovered the truth that all men were equal. The epic origin of America was not an exodus and a fledgling theocracy. It is a tale of shipwrecked castaways of all classes marooned in the wilderness fending for themselves in any way they could--a story that illuminates who we are as a nation today.

This Handbook provides a comprehensive roadmap to the burgeoning area of Afro-Latin American Studies. Afro-Latins as a civilization developed during the period of slavery, obtaining cultural contributions from Indigenous and European worlds, while today they are enriched by new social configurations derived from contemporary migrations from Africa. The essays collected in this volume speak to scientific production that has been promoted in the region from the humanities and social sciences with the aim of understanding the phenomenon of the African diaspora as a specific civilizing element. With contributions from world-leading figures in their fields overseen by an eminent international editorial board, this Handbook features original, authoritative articles organized in four coherent parts: • Disciplinary Studies; • Problem Focused Fields; • Regional and Country Approaches; • Pioneers of Afro-Latin American Studies. The Routledge Handbook of Afro-Latin American Studies will not only serve as the major reference text in the area of Afro-Latin American Studies but will also provide the agenda for future new research.

From the 1520s through the 1580s, thousands of African slaves fled captivity in Spanish Panama and formed their own communities in the interior of the isthmus. African Maroons in Sixteenth-Century Panama, a primary source reader, edited by Robert C. Schwaller, documents this marronage in the context of five decades of African resistance to slavery. The self-sufficiency of the Maroons, along with their periodic raids against Spanish settlements, sparked armed conflict as Spaniards sought to conquer the maroon communities and kill or re-enslave their populations. After decades of struggle, Maroons succeeded in negotiating a peace with Spanish authorities and establishing the first two free Black towns in the Americas. The little-known details of this dramatic history emerge in these pages, traced through official Spanish accounts, reports, and royal edicts, as well as excerpts from several English sources that recorded alliances between Maroons and English privateers in the region. The contrasting Spanish and English accounts reveal Maroons' attempts to turn European antagonism to their advantage; and, significantly, several accounts feature direct testimony from Maroons. Most importantly, this reader includes translations of the first peace agreements made between a European empire and African Maroons, and the founding documents of the free-Black communities of Santiago del Príncipe and Santa Cruz la Real—the culmination of the first successful African resistance movement in the Americas. Schwaller has translated all the documents into English and presents each with a short introduction, thorough annotations, and full historical, cultural, and geographical context, making this volume accessible to undergraduate students while remaining a unique document collection for scholars.

A collection of essays that examine how the history of slavery and race in the United States has been interpreted and inserted at public historic sites For decades racism and social inequity have stayed at the center of the national conversation in the United States, sustaining the debate around public historic places and monuments and what they represent. These conversations are a reminder of the crucial role that public history professionals play in engaging public audiences on subjects of race and slavery. This "difficult history" has often remained un- or underexplored in our public discourse, hidden from view by the tourism industry, or even by public history professionals themselves, as they created historic sites, museums, and public squares based on white-centric interpretations of history and heritage. Challenging History, through a collection of essays by a diverse group of scholars and practitioners, examines how difficult histories, specifically those of slavery and race in the United States, are being interpreted and inserted at public history sites and in public history work. Several essays explore the successes and challenges of recent projects, while others discuss gaps that public historians can fill at sites where Black history took place but is absent in the interpretation. Through case studies, the contributors reveal the entrenched false narratives that public history workers are countering in established public history spaces and the work they are conducting to reorient our collective understanding of the past. History practitioners help the public better understand the world. Their choices help to shape ideas about heritage and historical remembrances and can reform, even transform, worldviews through more inclusive and ethically narrated histories. Challenging History invites public historians to consider the ethical implications of the narratives they choose to share and makes the case that an inclusive, honest, and complete portrayal of the past has the potential to reshape collective memory and ideas about the meaning of American history and citizenship.

When her mom died, DJ had to move in with her grandmother, internationally famous ’60s fashion model Katherine Carter. Now Mrs. Carter’s opened a boarding home for young ladies, and DJ—who would rather wear her basketball team uniform than haute couture—is just sure they’ll all be unbearable fashion snobs. One by one, the girls arrive and begin to figure out how to fit into this new family, getting to know each other and forming friendships. Sure, there’s an aspiring diva or two, but before long, the Carter House girls are dating, fighting, laughing, shopping, sharing clothes, purses, shoes … and their deepest secrets. DJ may not turn into the perfect little lady her grandmother has in mind, but one thing’s for certain—with all these new “sisters,” her life will never be the same!