Showing titles in Caribbean & West Indies

The oral history of Britain’s first West Indian immigrants and their descendants In 1948 the former troop ship Windrush made the 30-day journey across the Atlantic from Jamaica. The arrival of its 500 passengers, the first generation of Caribbean migrants in the UK, was the initial step in the...

Shares the spiritual wisdom of Rastafari through the stories, teachings, and traditions of practicing Rastas in Jamaica Includes the author’s interviews with bush doctors, healers, and Rastafarians gathered during his 15 years of living in Jamaica Reveals the old ways of the...

The French Revolution in San Domingo by Lothrop Stoddard is a captivating and meticulously researched classic that vividly chronicles the dramatic, horrifying chaos of France's richest colony during the revolutionary pandemonium of the 1790s. Once known as San Domingue (Santo Domingo), the prosperous French-speaking portion of the island eventually became the independent nation of Haiti at the end of the revolutionary period.

In Surviving Slavery in the British Caribbean, Randy M. Browne looks past the familiar numbers of life and death and into a human drama in which enslaved Africans and their descendants struggled to survive against their enslavers, their environment, and sometimes one another.

During his life and even after his death, Captain William Kidd’s name was known around England and the American colonies. He was infamous for the very crime for which he was hanged, piracy. This book by Rebecca Simon dives into the details of the two-year manhunt for Captain Kidd and the events that ensued afterward. Captain Kidd was hanged in 1701, and from that sprung a massive hunt for all pirates led by the British during a period known as the Golden Age of Piracy. Ironically, public executions only led to pirates’ growth in popularity and interest.

From the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Cuba: An American History comes a heartbreaking yet redemptive memoir about migration, separation, and the love of one family forcing its way through the fissures of history. In 1963, four years after Fidel Castro came to power, Ada Ferrer’s mother...

"My name has become a horror to all those who want slavery," declared Jean‑Jacques Dessalines as he announced the independence of Haiti, the most radical nation‑state during the Age of Revolution and the first country ever to permanently outlaw slavery. Enslaved for the first thirty years of his life, Dessalines (c. 1758-1806) joined the revolution that abolished slavery within the French colony. Then he became a general in the colonial army of the new French Republic. When it was discovered that France once again supported slavery, Dessalines declared war on his former allies.

Brought to you by Penguin. The only novel from the world-renowned writer C.L.R. James - this extraordinary, big-hearted exploration of class was the first novel by a black West Indian to be published in the UK 'As he walked home he looked up at the myriads of stars, shining in the moonlight. Did...

Castro: A Biography by Consent offers the most comprehensive and in-depth life history of one of the most iconic and controversial revolutionary leaders of the modern world. Respected by some, despised by others, Fidel Castro was a force to reckon with, and Claudia Furiati spent nine years of intensive research unraveling and chronicling his story through seven decades of Cuban history.

The first and only successful slave revolution in the Americas began in 1791 when thousands of brutally exploited slaves rose up against their masters on Saint-Domingue, the most profitable colony in the 18th-century Atlantic world. Within a few years, the slave insurgents forced the French administrators of the colony to emancipate them, a decision ratified by revolutionary Paris in 1794. This victory was a stunning challenge to the order of master/slave relations throughout the Americas, including the Southern United States.

When you hear about one of the biggest scandals in modern home office history, it piques your interest. The Windrush Scandal is an example of the mentality of a bygone era in operation at the top levels of the UK government. Citizens of the British Commonwealth were invited to stay in the UK indefinitely between the end of the 1940s and the start of the 1970s in an attempt to bolster the UK labor market. Many people took up the invitation, upending their lives in an attempt to create a better life in their mother country.

Combining biography, history, and politics, Our Man Down in Havana investigates the real story behind Greene's fictional one. This includes his many visits to a pleasure island that became a revolutionary island, turning his chance involvement into a political commitment. Exploiting a wealth of archival material and interviews with key protagonists, Our Man Down in Havana delves into the story behind and beyond the author's prophetic Cuban tale, focusing on one slice of Greene's manic life: a single novel and its complex history.

For millennia, people have utilized plants as foods, medicines, hallucinogens, clothing, shelter, perfumes, dyes, and even poisons. In the Caribbean, medicinal and practical use of plants began with its first inhabitants, the Amerindians. New plants and knowledge were introduced through both...

Brought to you by Penguin. From award-winning writer and theorist Tao Leigh Goffe, an urgent investigation into the intertwined history of colonialism and the climate crisis – and the lessons we can learn to fight for a better world. Our planet is on the precipice of dramatic ecological...

***LONGLISTED FOR THE 2019 JHALAK PRIZE*** A leading new exploration of the Windrush generation featuring David Lammy, Lenny Henry, Corinne Bailey Rae, Sharmaine Lovegrove, Hannah Lowe, Jamz Supernova, Natasha Gordon and Rikki Beadle-Blair. For the pioneers of the Windrush generation, Britain...

For five horrific weeks after Christmas in 1831, Jamaica was convulsed by an uprising of its enslaved people. What started as a peaceful labor strike quickly turned into a full-blown revolt, leaving hundreds of plantation houses in smoking ruins. By the time British troops had put down the rebels, more than a thousand Jamaicans lay dead from summary executions and extrajudicial murder. While the rebels lost their military gamble, their sacrifice accelerated the larger struggle for freedom in the British Atlantic.

Howard Jones provides a concise, incisive, and dramatic account of the disastrous attempt to overthrow Castro in April 1961. Drawing on recently declassified CIA documents, Jones deftly examines the train of missteps and self-deceptions that led to the invasion of U.S.-trained exiles at the Bay of Pigs. Ignoring warnings from the ambassador to Cuba, the Eisenhower administration put in motion an operation that proved nearly unstoppable, even after the inauguration of John F. Kennedy.

Brought to you by Penguin. This Penguin Classic is performed by Yasmin Mwanza. This definitive recording includes an introduction by Sarah Salih. Written in 1857, this is the autobiography of a Jamaican woman whose fame rivalled Florence Nightingale's during the Crimean War. Seacole's offer to...

Life in Jamaica changed rapidly with the arrival of the Spanish, beginning a torturous history of European colonization that only resulted in Jamaica’s independence in 1962. Imperialism not only affected indigenous people, but also gave rise to modern nationalist movements and famous advocates like Marcus Garvey. Modern Jamaica: The History of the Caribbean Island from Christopher Columbus to Today chronicles how the island’s history progressed, from Columbus’ historic voyages to the modern era. You will learn about Jamaica like never before.

The themes of the history of Cuba are as vast as they are inspiring. Cuba has stared death in the face throughout its rocky history, and most of the time it has gazed into the eyes of death and smiled. Over and over, oppressors have attempted to seize this island and its riches for their own selfish purposes. And over and over, revolutions have risen up to conquer in an attempt to return Cuba to its people. The story of Cuba is a tale of courage and sacrifice, of horrific oppression and inspiring vision.