Regenerations: African American Literature and Culture is a new series devoted to reprinting editions of important African American texts that either have fallen out of print or have failed to receive the attention they deserve.
Regenerations encourages research that develops and extends the understanding of African American literary and cultural history, while promoting regional and local research that represents the complex dynamics of African American experience.
For all books published in this series, we will seek out texts with wide and varied appeal, and we will seek out scholars who are committed to providing original research on the authors and texts. Each book in the series will benefit from collaborations between experienced and emerging scholars and will feature strong biographical and historical introductions, full annotations when appropriate, and, when possible, an appendix with relevant materials by or about the author.
In addition to producing authoritative editions, Regenerations will serve the field by encouraging research that develops and extends our understanding of African American literary and cultural history. We are especially interested in texts that benefit from and promote regional and even local research, so as to represent the complex dynamics of African American experience, including great mobility and significant activity beyond the cities and states usually taken to be the main centers of African American community and literature.
In the selection and presentation of texts published in the Regenerations series, we hope to encourage research on the dynamics of geographical influence—from points of departure to multiple centers of arrival, from the “New Southern Studies” to reconsiderations of African American resettlements in Canada, from research on New England history to studies of the Black West, and from the American Midwest to the Caribbean and Latin America.
The first book in the Regenerations series is Hearts of Gold. Written by J. McHenry Jones, this novel was originally published in 1896 and will be rereleased in February of 2010 with the addition of an introduction and appendix. This book is edited by John Ernest, West Virginia University and Eric Gardner, Saginaw Valley State University.
Series edited by John Ernest, West Virginia University and Joycelyn K. Moody, University of Texas at San Antonio.
Reviews
"[This] series will expand the scholarly discussion about the ways in which such texts help us to rethink the field and insure that the books will be taught in the classroom and thereby be sustained for the next generation. . . .Professors Ernest and Moody have the expertise to insure the highest quality for these aspects of publication."
Sharon Harris, Director, Humanities Institute and Professor of English, University of Connecticut.
"As the editor of African American Review, Joycelyn K. Moody has had her finger on the pulse of new scholarship. . . . . [while] John Ernest [is] a scholarly editor whose work is careful, insightful, and accessible. . . ."
Frances Smith Foster, Charles Howard Candler Professor of English and Women's Studies, Emory University
"This [series] recognizes the enhanced role of the archive in literary research--research libraries and historical societies that have preserved the letters and papers of non-canonical writers. Such authors, whose work has been neglected are now being presented in the scholarship of literary critics as they expand the definition of the canon and revise its interpretation. . . ."
Caroline F. Sloat, Director of Book Publication, American Antiquarian Society "
"[Regenerations: African American Literature and Culture] has the potential to be a vital, exciting series that will make available neglected texts that can help us to rethink African American literary and cultural traditions."
Robert S. Levine, Distinguished Scholar-Teacher, University of Maryland
