Plantation Church

How African American Religion Was Born in Caribbean Slavery

Noel Leo Erskine

Highlights cross cultural theologies and ecclesiologies
Explores what the meaning of church is when people of African descent are in the cultural and political majority, or minority

Plantation Church

How African American Religion Was Born in Caribbean Slavery

Noel Leo Erskine

Description

Noel Leo Erskine investigates the history of the Black Church as it developed both in the United States and the Caribbean after the arrival of enslaved Africans. Typically, when people talk about "the Black Church" they are referring to African-American churches in the U.S., but in fact, the majority of African slaves were brought to the Caribbean. It was there, Erskine argues, that the Black religious experience was born. The massive Afro-Caribbean population was able to establish a form of Christianity that preserved African Gods and practices, but fused them with Christian teachings, resulting in religions such as Cuba's Santería. The Black religious experience in the U.S. was markedly different because African Americans were a political and cultural minority. The Plantation Church became a place of solace and resistance that provided its members with a sense of kinship, not only to each other but also to their ancestral past.
Despite their common origins, the Caribbean and African American Church are almost never studied together. Plantation Church examines the parallel histories of these two strands of the Black Church, showing where their historical ties remain strong and where different circumstances have led them down unexpectedly divergent paths. The result will be a work that illuminates the histories, theologies, politics, and practices of both branches of the Black Church.

Plantation Church

How African American Religion Was Born in Caribbean Slavery

Noel Leo Erskine

Plantation Church

How African American Religion Was Born in Caribbean Slavery

Noel Leo Erskine

Author Information

Noel Leo Erskine is Professor of Theology and Ethics at Candler School of Theology and the Laney Graduate School of Arts and Sciences at Emory University. He has been a visiting Professor in ten schools in six countries. His books include King Among the Thologians and From Garvey to Marley.

Plantation Church

How African American Religion Was Born in Caribbean Slavery

Noel Leo Erskine

Reviews and Awards

"Through a helpful synthesis of scholarly literature and primary-source evidence, Erskine offers intriguing ideas as the roots of African-American and Caribbean Christianity are considered."--Anglican and Episcopal History

"This book is one of those rare scholarly corrections that offers profound wisdom for academic and popular audiences. Noel Erskine mounts compelling evidence that the black religious experience began in the Caribbean and not in the United States. How refreshing that he does so with fluid storytelling and a writing style that urges the reader to pursue each page with expectations of new knowledge." --Dwight N. Hopkins, co-editor of The Cambridge Companion to Black Theology

"A brilliantly provocative and unprecedented book, told with both intimately personal prose and comprehensive and convincing data, with insights that will radically change the way we have conceptualized Black Atlantic religious traditions. This is the book that we have been waiting for. It is truly a tour de force, a must read for all!" --Kamari M. Clarke, Professor of Anthropology and International and Area Studies, Yale University

"Plantation Church is a significant contribution for theologians and students seeking to understand the development of black Christian communities. Moreover, the book is truly international in its scope, demonstrating the necessity of treating transnationalism as characteristic of religious life in the Afro-Atlantic."-HNET