Selected annotated 
bibliography of PCRS

Analyzes the ways in which 16th century English texts deployed the figure of the "barbarous" African for the sake of an English civilizational project. The book focuses on how English discourses fixated upon presumed linguistic errors in speech made by "foreign" speakers in order to buttress a sense of English belonging and displace anxieties about English itself being a barbarous idiom. It regards discussions in the fields of Renaissance studies, language, and English history.

This book engages disparate fields—Black Studies, Early American Studies and Early Modern Studies (15th century to 19th century)—to converse with one another about how material and visual culture informed and misinformed constitutions of the African continent, slave trading and slavery, and the racial difference of Black Africans. The anthology places Black life at the center of analysis and critical inquiry to access voices and subversive acts. It uncovers the power of Blackness as a cultural, ideological, and structural category that affirms Black life and identity.

Stevens examines the encounter between the inhabitants of the Old World and New during the early modern period through Walter Ong’s visual metaphors and tropes. He explores the naked body as a problematic signifier since a recurring figure within the many narrative accounts of the New World encounters is that of the “naked savage.” This article traces the discourse of self and the naked body of the Native as trope to understand that the signification of this body did not always imply a person.

This article examines the French portrayal of Haudenosaunee culture and politics established by Jesuits writers in 17th century New France. Stevens explores the generic shifts that occur in the writings associated with Indigenous and French encounters during the early modern period. Stevens argues that over the centuries the Haudenosaunee embraced the notion of ongoing resistance to colonialism and their role as spokespeople in Indigenous affairs throughout the Americas.

This article investigates the enduring stereotype of the warlike Iroquois in early American writings and visual representations in the 18th and 19th centuries. Stevens traces the material culture of the tomahawk and its associations in portrayals of the Haudenosaunee people. Through a triangulated research paradigm, this article examines the Haudenosaunee culture and its representations by European settlers.

A collection of essays which offer a reconceptualization of U.S. history from the early modern period to the present underpinned by Native history and sovereignty. The work is geared towards offering educators today a set of crucial pedagogical devices. The essays in this compendium engage the study of U.S. history, anticolonialism, and sovereignty among many other fields.

This chapter interrogates French representations of the Haudenosaunee in the 17th and 18th centuries. The essay examines the enduring stereotype of “savagery” created to demonize Indigenous peoples in the Americas. Stevens traces the stereotype from the legacy of Haudenosaunee ferocity from written and visual representations created by the French during their colonial project in North America.

A study on appropriations of Shakespeare and race in a 21st century U.S. context. The book questions the assumed universalism of Shakespeare and argues that theater practitioners should examine the semiotics of race in their productions. The book also addresses the use of Shakespeare in prison reform programs and argues for participant-centric programs that allow for appropriation and adaptation. It analyzes film adaptions, community theater, and the use of blackface.

A collection of essays discussing the racialized elements with which all of Shakespeare's works are invested. The essays draw upon a wide range of source materials from a variety of contexts to interrogate how race has been constructed through the prism of Shakespeare. The compendium as a whole engages conversations in the study of Shakespeare, global history, postcolonialism, performance studies, Blackness, and more.

Examines Shakespeare, race, and colorblind casting, drawing on a wide range of source materials in a variety of contexts. Thompson engages with the contemporary production history of Shakespeare and interrogates the widely held belief of Shakespeare’s universalism. The compendium discusses the study of Shakespeare, Blackness, performance studies, and more.

The book charts how African American medievalisms in the 19th and 20th century were used to speak against white contemporaries. Vernon attends carefully to the intersection between medieval studies and African American cultural studies as a framework for reading against a normative and dominant whiteness in both scholarly fields. In addition to the aforementioned fields, it engages discussions in cultural studies and literary studies more broadly.

A cultural history of pedagogy in Muslim West Africa reaching from the medieval and early modern periods into the present. Ware offers a ground-level exploration of how religious epistemology configured human corporeality in West Africa through the concept of the "walking Quran," and how this conceptualization played into revolutionary, abolitionist, and anticolonial movements without reliance upon Western discourses of the same. The work engages the study of religion, embodiment, Islam, West Africa, abolitionism, and anticolonialism.

Analyzes the figure of the so-called “Saracen” woman in medieval French literature in the 12th and 13th centuries. The book uses thematic patterns in the representation of these figures—such as the accented whiteness of crusader-abetting “Saracen” princesses, and the accented Blackness of those who resist the crusaders—to illuminate the intersection of racialization and imperial ambition in medieval French cultural contexts. The work thus explores discussions in the study of French literature, Blackness, conversion, and the crusades.

Investigates theories of racial difference in 18th-century Britain and argues that skin color became the dominate marker of difference in the late 18th century. Wheeler traces the ways cultural signs such as clothing and religion were part of identifying human variety prior to the 18th century. This work engages in discussions of racialization, literary history, religion, and enlightenment thought.

Explores the uses of Blackness in 14th century English literature. It argues that the medieval reception of classical rhetoric is central to medieval race-thinking and the construction of what would later become modern racial ideology. The book makes the case that while in modernity the elements of race have coalesced and congealed, in the Middle Ages race is still under construction. It examines the relation between race and religion in metaphors deploying Blackness.

Explores the dense engagement with Milton in the works of a Phillis Wheatley in the 18th century United States. Wilburn places this engagement within wider Black literary and Africanist discursive traditions. The article engages conversations on U.S. history, Milton, and captivity and enslavement.

Examines the presence and influence of John Milton within the early 17th century in a variety of early African American writing. Wilburn examines Milton’s presence in early African Americans’ rhetorical affiliations and his satanic epic for messianic purposes of freedom and racial uplift. Wilburn contends that African Americans executed a refusal to rhetorical incompetence by reinventing writing styles, themes, symbolism, imagery, and key figures in Milton’s writings to connect to the religious or scriptural significance in his texts.

Tells the story of Renaissance Europe’s first Black poet, Juan Latino, during the 16th century. His publication Austrias Carmen (Song of John of Austria) recounts the battle of Lepanto in 1571. Wright analyzes Juan Latino’s life through discourses on race, religion, and blood purity practices.

A collection of essays exploring medieval English representations of Jews in literature and visual arts prior to the Norman conquest of 1066. The essays range in theme from studies of scriptural commentaries to images found in Christian manuscripts, excavating as a whole the deep history of English anti-Semitism. The book engages the study of medieval England, anti-Semitism, and Christianity.

Compendium of essays about how the “East” was conceptualized and materially represented in early modern English dramas. The essays focus on staging conventions related to plays such as The Tempest, The Historie of Orlando Furioso,A Christian Turned Turk, and others. Of interest to students of English, performance studies, and material culture.