Overview
- Winner of the 2019 Haitian Studies Book Award
- Brings to light the contributions of Haitian statesman Baron de Vastey in the development of postcolonial and critical race theory
- Demonstrates the influence of de Vastey's writings and the work of prominent nineteenth and early twentieth-century abolitionists and anti-colonialists
- Argues for the significance of writing by people of color from French Saint-Domingue dating to before formal Haitian independence
- Includes supplementary material: sn.pub/extras
Part of the book series: The New Urban Atlantic (NUA)
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Table of contents (5 chapters)
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Front Matter
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Back Matter
Keywords
About this book
Focusing on the influential life and works of the Haitian political writer and statesman, Baron de Vastey (1781-1820), in this book Marlene L. Daut examines the legacy of Vastey’s extensive writings as a form of what she calls black Atlantic humanism, a discourse devoted to attacking the enlightenment foundations of colonialism. Daut argues that Vastey, the most important secretary of Haiti’s King Henry Christophe, was a pioneer in a tradition of deconstructing colonial racism and colonial slavery that is much more closely associated with twentieth-century writers like W.E.B. Du Bois, Frantz Fanon, and Aimé Césaire. By expertly forging exciting new historical and theoretical connections among Vastey and these later twentieth-century writers, as well as eighteenth- and nineteenth-century black Atlantic authors, such as Phillis Wheatley, Olaudah Equiano, William Wells Brown, and Harriet Jacobs, Daut proves that any understanding of the genesis of Afro-diasporic thought must include Haiti’s Baron de Vastey.
Reviews
“This is a richly documented study of this key figure in the invention of the radical anti-slavery movement and anti-colonialism, and will be essential reading for scholars and students of Haitian Revolutionary studies and postcolonial theory.” (Nick Nesbitt, French Studies, Vol. 73 (3), July, 2019)
Authors and Affiliations
About the author
Bibliographic Information
Book Title: Baron de Vastey and the Origins of Black Atlantic Humanism
Authors: Marlene L. Daut
Series Title: The New Urban Atlantic
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-47067-6
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan New York
eBook Packages: Literature, Cultural and Media Studies, Literature, Cultural and Media Studies (R0)
Copyright Information: The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2017
Softcover ISBN: 978-1-349-69376-4Published: 12 March 2019
eBook ISBN: 978-1-137-47067-6Published: 31 October 2017
Edition Number: 1
Number of Pages: XL, 244
Number of Illustrations: 8 b/w illustrations
Topics: Postcolonial/World Literature, Eighteenth-Century Literature, Literary History, Imperialism and Colonialism