Deep Roots
Rice Farmers in West Africa and the African Diaspora
Format:Paperback
Publisher:Indiana University Press
Published:11th Jul '14
Currently unavailable, and unfortunately no date known when it will be back
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.
This study is an excellent contribution to the growing literature on food in precolonial Africa. . . . [I]t is a trailblazing work in its innovative amalgamation of archaeological, linguistic, and written source materials.
-- Jeremy Rich * International Journal of African Historical Studies *This study is an excellent contribution to the growing literature on food in precolonial Africa. . . . [I]t is a trailblazing work in its innovative amalgamation of archaeological, linguistic, and written source materials.
* International Journal of African Historical Studies *Deep Roots, an important and innovative book, pioneers a multidisciplinary methodology, which substantially compensates for the lack of written documentation . . . and archeology data during the formative period of the transatlantic slave trade in Africa.
* American Historical Review *Fields-Black has written an important book, thoroughly researched, persuasively argued, and engagingly written. It adds a major new chapter to our understanding of the African diaspora. Vol. 76, No. 3, August 2010
* The Journal of Southern History *Fields-Black has written an important groundbreaking agricultural and Diasporic cultural history.
* Georgia Historical Quarterly *A stimulating study that deserves attention in graduate seminars . . . in African history . . . and in African diaspora studies. December, 2010
* HISTORIAN *While Deep Roots is a scholarly endeavor anyone interested in South Carolina's rice history or African history would find it both fascinating and full of interesting facts, stories, illustrations and graphs that bring the story to life.February 18, 2009
* Walterboro, SC *Fields-Black manages to make her research and its implications accessible to a wider audience. . . . Readers will appreciate the book's clarity of expression and revealing discussions of historical analysis and argumentation. . . . Recommended.December 2009
* Choice *[This] book makes a significant contribution to our understanding of rice cultivation in West Africa . . . .Vol. 50 2009
-- Erik Gilbert * Arkansas State University *In fine, Deep Roots represents an important contribution to the literature on risiculture in West Africa.XL.4 Spring 2010
-- Peter A. Coclanis * University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill *Deep Roots is a valuable addition to research on African rice systems and their origins. ...it contributes to the understanding of the rich cultural diversity of the coastal region extending from Gambia south and east to Liberia. Vol. 53.1 April 2010
-- Laurence C. Becker * Oregon State University, Corvallis, Oregon *The scope of the work makes it an important addition for African and Diaspora studies, as well as those more generally interested in the transference of ideas and ecology.
* Journal of West African HistoISBN: 9780253016102
Dimensions: unknown
Weight: 399g
296 pages