0812224930 
Paperback Undercurrents of Power : Aquatic Culture in the African Diaspora / Kevin Dawson.
Publication year: 2021
Format: Paperback
Publisher: Philadelphia : University of Pennsylvania Press,
Resource type: Physical
ISBN: 9780812224931 :
Notes:
Introduction: Waterscapes of the African Diaspora PART I. SWIMMING CULTURE Chapter 1. Atlantic African Aquatic Cultures: A Cross-Cultural Comparison Chapter 2. Cultural Meanings of Recreational Swimming and Surfing Chapter 3. Aquatic Sports and Performance Rituals: Gender, Bravery, and Honor Chapter 4. History from Below: Enslaved Underwater Divers Chapter 5. Undercurrents of Power: Challenging Racial Hierarchies from Below PART II. CANOE CULTURE Chapter 6. African Canoe-Makers: Constructing Floating Cultures Chapter 7. Mountains Divide and Rivers Unite: Atlantic African Canoemen Chapter 8. Maritime Continuities: African Canoes on New World Waters Chapter 9. The Floating Economies of Slaves and Slaveholders Chapter 10. Sacred Vessels, Sacred Waters: The Cultural Meanings of Dugout Canoes Chapter 11. A World Afloat: Mobile Slave Communities Chapter 12. The Watermen's Song: Canoemen's Aural Waterscapes Conclusion. A Sea Change in Atlantic History Epilogue Notes Index
Kevin Dawson considers how enslaved Africans carried aquatic skills-swimming, diving, boat making, even surfing-to the Americas. Undercurrents of Power not only chronicles the experiences of enslaved maritime workers, but also traverses the waters of the Atlantic repeatedly to trace and untangle cultural and social traditions. Long before the rise of New World slavery, West Africans were adept swimmers, divers, canoe makers, and canoeists. They lived along riverbanks, near lakes, or close to the ocean. In those waterways, they became proficient in diverse maritime skills, while incorporating water and aquatics into spiritual understandings of the world. Transported to the Americas, slaves carried with them these West African skills and cultural values. Indeed, according to Kevin Dawson's examination of water culture in the African diaspora, the aquatic abilities of people of African descent often surpassed those of Europeans and their descendants from the age of discovery until well
Series title: The Early Modern Americas
Description:
360 pages : 29 illus. ; 23 cm.
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