How Came It Yours?
Black South Carolinians and the Making of America
edited by Simon Lewis and Kameelah L. Martin
foreword by Bernard E. Powers, Jr.
Paperback
978-1-64336-734-7
Published: Jun 3 2027
Hardcover
978-1-64336-665-4
Published: Jun 3 2027
Ebook
978-1-64336-735-4
Published: Jun 3 2027
OA Ebook
978-1-64336-735-4
Published: Jun 3 2027
The inclusion of this book in the Open Carolina collection is made possible by the generous funding of
Uncovering, uplifting, and reframing Black South Carolinians' place in American History
In 1903, W. E. B. Du Bois, confronted with the arrogance of white claims to the United States, famously burst out in one of his most ringingly memorable paragraphs in The Souls of Black Folk. "Your country?" he asks, affronted, incredulous, "How came it yours?" insisting that African Americans were an essential part of the American story. More than a century later, that question still needs to be asked, especially in South Carolina. How Came It Yours? seeks to remedy this massive gap in public consciousness by bringing together accounts of the remarkable contributions of Black South Carolinians in the political, cultural, and economic development of both the state and the nation.
Black South Carolinians' influence is remarkably wide and deep. It encompasses the physical transformation of the Lowcountry landscape; the building and maintaining of the state's oldest cities and towns; public education during Reconstruction; political and legal leadership; the struggle for civil rights; and outstanding achievements in the arts, sciences, film, and sports. Their story is not confined to a separate category of "Black history" but is part of the proud history of the nation itself.
Featuring eleven essays by established and emerging scholars, this volume offers a wide-ranging account of Black South Carolinian achievement while showing how much remains to be recovered, recognized, and remembered. How Came It Yours? answers Du Bois's question by insisting that Black South Carolinians' contributions are not peripheral to American history. They are constitutive of it.
Simon Lewis is professor of English emeritus at the College of Charleston, where he taught African and postcolonial literature. He is the author of White Women Writers and Their African Invention and British and African Literature in Transnational Context. He lives in Charleston, South Carolina.
Kameelah L. Martin is professor of African American Studies and English at the College of Charleston. She is the author of Conjuring Moments in African American Literature and Envisioning Black Feminist Voodoo Aesthetics. She lives in Charleston, South Carolina.
