The eighteenth and nineteenth centuries saw both the consolidation of American print culture and the establishment of an African American literary tradition, yet the two are too rarely considered in tandem. In this landmark volume, a stellar group of established and emerging scholars ranges over periods, locations, and media to explore African Americans' diverse contributions to early American print culture, both on the page and off.

The book's chapters consider domestic novels and gallows narratives, Francophone poetry and engravings of Liberia, transatlantic lyrics and San Francisco newspapers. Together, they consider how close attention to the archive can expand the study of African American literature well beyond matters of authorship to include issues of editing, illustration, circulation, and reading--and how this expansion can enrich and transform the study of print culture more generally.

Author: Lara Langer Cohen
Binding Type: Paperback
Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press
Published: 12/02/2014
Series: Material Texts
Pages: 432
Weight: 1.5lbs
Size: 8.90h x 6.00w x 1.10d
ISBN: 9780812223347

About the Author
Lara Langer Cohen teaches English at Swarthmore College and is author of The Fabrication of American Literature: Fraudulence and Antebellum Print Culture, also available from the University of Pennsylvania Press. Jordan Alexander Stein teaches English at Fordham University.