In Gullah Spirituals musicologist Eric Crawford traces Gullah Geechee songs from their beginnings in West Africa to their height as songs for social change and Black identity in the twentieth century American South. While much has been done to study, preserve, and interpret Gullah culture in the lowcountry and sea islands of South Carolina and Georgia, some traditions like the shouting and rowing songs have been all but forgotten. This work, which focuses primarily on South Carolina's St. Helena Island, illuminates the remarkable history, survival, and influence of spirituals since the earliest recordings in the 1860s. Grounded in an oral tradition with a dynamic and evolving character, spirituals proved equally adaptable for use during social and political unrest and in unlikely circumstances. Most notably, the island's songs were used at the turn of the century to help rally support for the United States' involvement in World War I and to calm racial tensions between black and white soldiers. In the 1960s, civil rights activists adopted spirituals as freedom songs, though many were unaware of their connection to the island. Gullah Spirituals uses fieldwork, personal recordings, and oral interviews to build upon earlier studies and includes an appendix with more than fifty transcriptions of St. Helena spirituals, many no longer performed and more than half derived from Crawford's own transcriptions. Through this work, Crawford hopes to restore the cultural memory lost to time while tracing the long arc and historical significance of the St. Helena spirituals.
Gullah songbook of spirituals and general use songs (pages 124-178).
This book explores the Gullah culture's direct link to Africa, via the sea islands of the American southeast.
The Gullah culture consists of African Americans who live in the Low-Country region of South Carolina and Georgia, which includes both the Coastal Plains and the Sea Islands. This book...
Collected over a period of nearly twenty-five years by Lydia Parrish, the sixty folk songs and attendant lore included in this book are evidence of antebellum traditions kept alive in the relatively isolated coastal regions of Georgia.
tory with commentary that boldly pointed out the impact that racism and limited economic opportunities had had on the Islanders.53 As Bailey's account unfolds, readers find ornate passages about Sapelo's landscape, the “old ways,” and ...
Ronald Daise lovingly weaves poetry, personal experience, spirituals, and stunning visuals, to connect the Gullah culture to West African values and traditions and the African Diaspora of three hundred years ago.
See commercial spirituals Engs, Robert, 86 environmental spectacles and plantation shows, 216–21 Epstein, ... 95e; “Sweet Canaan,” 195, 198t; “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot,” 92,93e Fields, Al G., 221 financial panic (1873), 99 Fisk, ...
Murray, Charlotte W.: “The Story of Harry T. Burleigh,” 366 Owen, B.: “Our Choral Heritage: Spirituals and Folk Hymns,” 280 Owens, James Garfield: . ... Ralph Ellison Preaches the Blues,” 863 O'Neal, Amy: “Living Blues .
Charleston's Gullah Recipes: The Gullah People have managed to keep many aspects of their cultural heritage alive today, as evident in their dialect and through their food.
This book is one of the first to analyze the operation of this auction and trace the lives of slaves before, during, and after their sale.