#PennCenterSyllabus
This list of teaching and research resources features books, essays, films, newspapers, primary documents, virtual exhibits, and other resources that center upon the influential Penn Center National Historic Landmark and the dynamic Gullah Geechee communities of the coastal southeast region. We have compiled this list as a reference for students and faculty who participate in the 2022-24 summer residences at the Penn Center, and for groups and individuals who wish to learn more about Gullah Geechee culture, history, and language. In the spirit of other crowdsourced online syllabi about African American history and culture, we encourage you to reach out to us with additional suggestions or corrections.
–Compiled by Dr. Barbara McCaskill (bmccaski@uga.edu) and Ms. Mikaela LaFave
Gullah Geechee Traditions and Culture
General
Cooper, Melissa. Making Gullah: A History of Sapelo Islanders, Race, and the American Imagination. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2017.
Gullah Roots, Fambul Tik, Youtube. Oct 10, 2020.
(Includes Gullah Geechee leaders visiting Sierra Leone, as well as important sites of Enslavement and Abolition.)
Lotson, Griffin. Georgia Black Fisherman with Griffin Lotson by Dionne Hoskins on November 24, 2014. NOAA Voices Oral History Archives.
“The People Time Forgot: The Gullah and the Low-country.” WVEC News, 1997. Brown Media Archives, UGA.
Philips, Tony. Life on Sapelo. SCAD Film and Television Department, 2015.
Smith, Gali. “Experience Savannah’s Rich Cultural Heritage.” Visit Savannah. Youtube.
Sumpter, Althea. “Geechee and Gullah Culture.” New Georgia Encyclopedia, last modified Sep 16, 2020.
Art: 2022 Artists in Residence at the Penn Center
Anina Major: http://www.aninamajor.com/ and Tamika Galanis: https://www.tamikagalanis.com/
Art: Contemporary Studies
Cavallo, Craig. The Ancient Craft of Gullah Basket Weaving. Saveur. March 31, 2016.
Light, Verneda, textiles and paintings: Textiles and art works of Gullah artist, poet, & historian, Verneda Lights.
Dance & Stage
Thompson, Katrina Dyonne. Ring Shout, Wheel About : The Racial Politics of Music and Dance in North American Slavery. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2014.
Food Studies
Carney, Judith Ann. Black Rice: The African Origins of Rice Cultivation in the Americas. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2009. (There are two editions — 2002 and 2009. There’s no difference between the two; the 2009 version is a reprint.)
“The People Time Forgot: The Gullah and the Low-Country.” WVEC News, 1997. Brown Media Archives, UGA. The People Time Forgot: The Gullah and the Low-country
Smart-Grosvenor, Vertamae. Vibration Cooking, Or, the Travel Notes of a Geechee Girl. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2011. Print.
Health & Medicine
Naylor, Gloria. Mama Day. New York: Vintage, 1989.
Language
Campbell, Emory. Gullah Cultural Legacies:: A Synopsis of Gullah Traditions, Customary Beliefs, Art forms and Speech on Hilton Head Island and vicinal Sea Islands in South Carolina and Georgia. Charleston, SC: Booksurge Publishing, 2008.
Gomez, Michael A. Exchanging Our Country Marks: The Transformation of African Identities in the Colonial and Antebellum South. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1988.
Montgomery, Michael, editor. Crucible of Carolina. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2017. Print.
Sea Island Translation Literacy Team, et al. De good nyews bout Jedus Christ wa Luke write : the Gospel according to Luke, in Gullah Sea Island Creole, with marginal text of the King James Version. American Bible Society, 1995.
The Skin Quilt Project– The Africanisms in Gullah/Geechee and African-American Culture. (See interview with Vermelle Bunnie Rodriguez, director of the Gullah Museum on Pawley’s Island.)
Smithsonian Exhibition on Lorenzo Dow Turner
“Talking Black in America.” Films On Demand, Films Media Group, 2019. (a small segment of this broader documentary centers on Gullah Geechee language)
Music: Books
Carawan, Guy, and Candie Carawan. Ain’t You Got a Right to the Tree of Life? : The People of Johns Island, South Carolina–Their Faces, Their Words, and Their Songs. Revised and expanded edition / new photographs by Ida Berman, Gary Hamilton, And others ; preface by Charles Joyner ; afterword by Bernice Johnson Reagon. Athens, University of Georgia Press, 1989.
Lotson, Griffin. Kumbaya. Independently Published, 2020.
Manigault-Bryant, LeRhonda. Talking to the Dead: Religion, Music, and Lived Memory among Gullah Geechee Women. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2014.
Parrish, Lydia. Slave Songs of the Georgia Sea Islands. Brown Thrasher ed. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1992.
Music: Performances
Ranky Tanky: https://www.rankytanky.com/
Bernice Johnson Reagon: https://www.bernicejohnsonreagon.com/
- In Conversation with Smithsonian Folkways In Conversation With Dr. Bernice Johnson Reagon [Interview Video]
- Artist Spotlight from Smithsonian Folkways: Bernice Johnson Reagon: Civil Rights song leader | Smithsonian Folkways Recordings
- DC Performance of “Ain’t Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me Around” in 2010: Bernice Reagon, “Ain’t Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me Around”, Washington, DC, Feb. 10, 2010
- Fresh Air Segment, originally from 1988: Bernice Johnson Reagon On Leading Freedom Songs During The Civil Rights Movement
Smithsonian Folkways Recordings: https://folkways.si.edu/
Sweet Honey in the Rock: https://sweethoneyintherock.org/
Gullah Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor Music Interview:
Feature Films and Documentaries
Circle Unbroken: A Gullah Journey From Africa To America (dir. Clark Santee, 2014)
Daughters of the Dust (dir. Julie Dash, 1992)
Gullah Gone (dir. Denise McGill, Sponsored by the Penn Center)
Life on Sapelo (dir. Tony Philips, sponsored by SCAD, Savannah College of Art and Design)
History
Penn Center
Slavery
Babb, Valerie. “Valerie Babb on the WANDERER, Global Georgia March 5, 2013,” Willson Center for the Humanities and Arts, University of Georgia. 2013.
Burton, Orville V. Penn Center: A History Preserved. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2014.
Gomez, Michael A. Exchanging Our Country Marks: The Transformation of African Identities in the Colonial and Antebellum South. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1998.
Gullah Roots, Fambul Tik, Youtube. Oct 10, 2020. (Includes Gullah Geechee leaders visiting Sierra Leone, as well as important sites of Enslavement and Abolition.)
Miles, Tiya. All That She Carried: The Journey of Ashley’s Sack, a Black Family Keepsake. New York: Random House, 2021.
Morgan, Philip D. African American Life in the Georgia Lowcountry: The Atlantic World and the Gullah Geechee. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2010.
Onion, Rebecca. “Understanding the Horror of Slavery Is Impossible. But a Simple Cotton Sack Can Bring Us Closer.” (Interview with Tiya Miles) Slate, 2021.
Powell, Timothy. “Ebos Landing.” New Georgia Encyclopedia, last modified Jul 17, 2020.
“The Wanderer: A Story of Slavery, Survival, and the Strength to Prevail.” Films On Demand, Films Media Group, 2018. (see 11:00 minute mark when the documentary begins its focus on Georgia and Jekyll Island)
The Civil War and Emancipation
Burton, Orville V. Penn Center: A History Preserved. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2014.
Charlotte Forten Grimké
“Celebrating Charlotte,” Salem State University.
Davis, Christina Lenore. “The collective identities of women teachers in black schools in the post-bellum South.” Athens: University of Georgia, PhD Dissertation, 2016.
Davis, Christina Lenore. “Reconstructing Black Education: Teachers’ Impact On Student Learning In The Post-Bellum South”. 2015: n. pag. Print.
“Ellen Garrison,” The Robbins House Concord’s African American History, 2021.
The Freedmen’s Teacher Project, Ronald Butchart. (A database that collects historical documents from more than 11,600 post-Civil War teachers.)
The Journals of Charlotte Forten Grimké (The Schomburg Library of Nineteenth-Century Black Women Writers). Barbara Stevenson, editor. New York: Oxford University Press, 1988.
Robert Smalls
DoubleBack Productions. Congressman Robert Smalls: A Patriot’s Journey from Slavery to Capitol Hill. Authored by Adrena Ifill, Sean Patrick Thomas, Andrew Billingsley, Stephen R. Wise, Lawrence Sanders Rowland. DVD. 2005.
Gates, Henry Louis, and Robert F. Smith. “Robert Smalls: A Slave Who Sailed Himself to Freedom,” Black History in Two Minutes.
Lineberry, Cate. “The Thrilling Tale of How Robert Smalls Seized a Confederate Ship and Sailed it to Freedom,” Smithsonian Magazine. June 13 2017.
Miller, Edward A. Gullah statesman: Robert Smalls from slavery to Congress, 1839-1915. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 2015.
Official US House of Representatives Page
Sterling, Dorothy. Captain of the Planter: The Story of Robert Smalls. Illustrated by Ernest Grichlow, Doubleday, 1958.
The Reconstruction and Post-Reconstruction
Barnwell, Jr., Thomas, Emory Campbell, and Carolyn Grant. Gullah Days: Hilton Head Islanders Before the Bridge, 1861-1956. Durham, NC: Blair, 2020.
Bell Jr, Malcolm. Drums and Shadows: Survival Studies Among the Georgia Coastal Negroes. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1986.
Burton, Orville V. Penn Center: A History Preserved. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2014.
McCaskill, Barbara, and Caroline Gebhard, eds. Post-Bellum, Pre-Harlem: African American Literature and Culture, 1877-1919. New York: New York University Press, 2006.
Rose, Willie L. N, and Comer V. Woodward. Rehearsal for Reconstruction: The Port Royal Experiment. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1999. Print. (Note that there are three editions: 1962, 1976, and 1999.)
The Twentieth-Century African American Freedom Struggle
Barnwell, Jr., Thomas, Emory Campbell, and Carolyn Grant. Gullah Days: Hilton Head Islanders Before the Bridge, 1861-1956. Durham, NC: Blair, 2020.
Burton, Orville V. Penn Center: A History Preserved. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2014.
Carawan, Guy, and Candie Carawan. Ain’t You Got a Right to the Tree of Life? : The People of Johns Island, South Carolina–Their Faces, Their Words, and Their Songs. Revised and expanded edition / new photographs by Ida Berman, Gary Hamilton, And others ; preface by Charles Joyner ; afterword by Bernice Johnson Reagon. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1989.
Cooper, Melissa. Making Gullah: A History of Sapelo Islanders, Race, and the American Imagination. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2017. Note:
Leggett, Bethany. “A Conversation with Griffin Lotson, a seventh-generation Geechee” Golden Isles. Dec. 28, 2018.
Lotson, Griffin. Kumbaya. Independently Published, 2020.
Education
Butchart, Ronald E. Schooling the Freed People: Teaching, Learning, and the Struggle for Black Freedom, 1861-1876. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2010.
College of Coastal Georgia Lib Guide Resource
Davis, Christina Lenore. “The collective identities of women teachers in black schools in the post-bellum South.” University of Georgia, PhD Dissertation, 2016.
Davis, Christina Lenore. “Reconstructing Black Education: Teachers’ Impact On Student Learning In The Post-Bellum South”. 2015: n. pag. Print.
“Ellen Garrison,” The Robbins House Concord’s African American History, 2021.
The Freedmen’s Teacher Project, Ronald Butchart. (A database that collects historical documents from more than 11,600 post-Civil War teachers.)
Land and Environment
Bailey, Maurice, and Nik Heynen. “Sweet (and sticky) redemption: Gullah/Geechee of Sapelo Island reclaim sugarcane to fight cultural erasure.” Scalawag. September 29, 2020.
Bullard, Mary. “Cumberland Island.” New Georgia Encyclopedia, last modified Jul 13, 2018.
Davis, Jingle, and Benjamin Galland. Island Time: An Illustrated History of St. Simons Island, Georgia. , 2013.
Flurry, Alan, interviewer. “Unscripted interview with UGA professor Nik Heynen.” Unpublished, September 15, 2019.
Halfacre, Angela. Delicate Balance: Constructing a Conservation Culture in the South Carolina Low Country. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 2012.
Hardy, Dean, and Nik Heynen. “‘I am Sapelo’” Racialized Uneven Development and Land Politics within the Gullah Geechee Corridor.” Environment and Planning E: Nature and Space. Jan 2021.
Hunter, John. “Jekyll Island.” New Georgia Encyclopedia, last modified Jan 9, 2021.
Koon, Mary. “St. Simons Island.” New Georgia Encyclopedia, last modified Feb 22, 2019.
Rogers, Ellen. “Sea Island.” New Georgia Encyclopedia, last modified Oct 25, 2021.
Rowland, Lawrence S. “Beaufort.” South Carolina Encyclopedia. May 2016, updated August 2021.
Rowland, Lawrence S. “Beaufort County.” South Carolina Encyclopedia. May 2016, updated August 2021.
Severson, Kim, author. “Reviving a Crop and an African- American Culture, Stalk by Stalk.” Photographs by Rinne Allen, New York Times, Dec. 8 2020.
Sullivan, Buddy. “Bryan County.” New Georgia Encyclopedia, last modified Aug 2, 2018.
Sullivan, Buddy. “McIntosh County.” New Georgia Encyclopedia, last modified Oct 31, 2018.
Sullivan, Buddy. “Sapelo Island.” New Georgia Encyclopedia, last modified Dec 2, 2019. https://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/articles/geography-environment/sapelo-island
Literature (fiction, nonfiction, poetry, memoirs)
Novels and Short Stories
Bailey, Cornelia Walker, and Christine Beldsoe. God, Dr. Buzzard and The Bolito Man:A Saltwater Geechee Talks about Life on Sapelo Island, Georgia. New York: Anchor Books, 2001.
Naylor, Gloria. Mama Day. New York: Vintage, 1989.
Keenan, Randall. If I Had Two Wings: Stories. New York: Norton, 2020.
Keenan, Randall. Let the Dead Bury Their Dead. New York: Harcourt, 1992.
Memoirs and Nonfiction
Jerkins, Morgan. Wandering in Strange Lands: A Daughter of the Great Migration Reclaims her Roots. Harper, 2020.
Morgan, Philip D. African American Life in the Georgia Lowcountry: The Atlantic World and the Gullah Geechee. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2010.
Poetry
Selected Works:
Head Off and Split. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press, 2011.
Rice. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press, 2013.
Selected Works:
Dub: Finding Ceremony. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2020.
M Archive: After the End of the World. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2018.
Spill: Scenes of Black Feminist Fugitivity. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2016.
Undrowned: Black Feminist Lessons from Marine Mammals. Chico, CA: AK Press, 2015.
Selected Works:
“Wade in the Water” (Dedicated to the “Geechee Gullah Ring Shouters”), Poetry Foundation.
Wade in the Water. Minneapolis, Graywolf Press, 2018.
Newspapers
Florida
- The Jacksonville Free Press, 1816-1917, 2005- 2019 (Duval County, FL)
- Florida Star, 1956-present (Duval County, FL)
Georgia
- Freemen’s Standard, 1868-18?? (Chatham County, GA)
- The Colored Tribune, 1875-76 (Chatham County, GA)
- The Savannah Tribune, 1876-1960 (Chatham County, GA) [The Savannah Tribune continues The Colored Tribune.]
- Atlanta Daily World, 1931-2003 (Fulton County, GA)
North Carolina
- African American Presbyterian, August 29, 1889 – September 15, 1938 (Wilmington, NC)
South Carolina
- South Carolina Leader, 1865-18?? (Charleston County, SC)
- The Charleston Advocate, 1867-68 (Charleston County, SC)
- Missionary Record, 1868-79 (Charleston County, SC)
- The Free Press, 1868-186? (Charleston County, SC)
- The Georgetown Planet, 1873-75 (Georgetown County, SC)
- The Afro American Citizen, 1899-1902 (Charleston County, SC)
Online Exhibits and Databases
Avery Research Institute, College of Charleston
Freedmen’s Bureau Database, African American Heritage, National Archives
International African American Museum
Lowcountry Digital History Initiative, College of Charleston
National Museum of African American History and Culture, Smithosonian
New Georgia Encyclopedia, Georgia Humanities, UGA Press
South Carolina Encyclopedia, South Carolina Humanities, University of South Carolina Press
Religion (see below for information on praise houses, the ring shout)
Books
Carawan, Guy, and Candie Carawan. Ain’t You Got a Right to the Tree of Life? : The People of Johns Island, South Carolina–Their Faces, Their Words, and Their Songs. Revised and expanded edition / new photographs by Ida Berman, Gary Hamilton, And others ; preface by Charles Joyner ; afterword by Bernice Johnson Reagon. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1989.
Judy, Ronald A. T. (Dis)forming the American Canon African-Arabic Slave Narratives and the Vernacular. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1993.
Manigault-Bryant, LeRhonda. Talking to the Dead: Religion, Music, and Lived Memory among Gullah Geechee Women. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2014.
McCaskill, Barbara, and Caroline Gebhard, eds. Post-Bellum, Pre-Harlem: African American Literature and Culture, 1877-1919. New York: New York University Press, 2006.
Morgan, Philip D. African American Life in the Georgia Lowcountry: The Atlantic World and the Gullah Geechee. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2010.
Sea Island Translation Literacy Team, et al. De good nyews bout Jedus Christ wa Luke write : the Gospel according to Luke, in Gullah Sea Island Creole, with marginal text of the King James Version. American Bible Society, 1995.
Film
The Black Church: This Is Our Story, This Is Our Song – Episode 1. Films On Demand, Films Media Group, 2021. (This is the first of two episodes, but the first episode covers such topics as Sapelo Island, the ring shout, and syncretism. Presented by Dr. Henry Louis Gates, Jr.).
Online Exhibits and Finding Aids
Fraser-Rahim, Muhammad. Enslaved and Freed African Muslims: Spiritual Wayfarers in the South and Lowcountry. Lowcountry Digital History Initiative, College of Charleston.
- Contains information on Salih Bilali and Bilali Mohammed: Salih Bilali and Bilali Mohammed · Enslaved and Freed African Muslims: Spiritual Wayfarers in the South and Lowcountry · Lowcountry Digital History Initiative
Goulding, Francis R., papers, ms2807, Hargrett Rare Book and Manuscript Library, The University of Georgia Libraries.
- Finding aid for Bilali manuscript in the holdings of UGA Libraries
Mendonca, Adrienn. “Georgia Sea Island Singers.” New Georgia Encyclopedia, last modified Feb 19, 2017.
Rosenbaum, Art. “McIntosh County Shouters.” New Georgia Encyclopedia, last modified Sep 29, 2020.
Sea Island Translation Literacy Team, et al. De good nyews bout Jedus Christ wa Luke write : the Gospel according to Luke, in Gullah Sea Island Creole, with marginal text of the King James Version. American Bible Society, 1995. Available at Hargrett Library at UGA: Ga Room BS350 .S437 L84 1995
The Ring Shout
Musical Recordings
Smithsonian Folk Ways
- The McIntosh County Shouters – Spirituals and Shout Songs from the Georgia Coast (Produced by Art Rosenbaum, Lamar Dodd School of Art)
- Spirituals and Shout Songs from the McIntosh County Shouters Spirituals and Shout Songs from the Georgia Coast
- Slave Shout Songs from the Coast of Georgia (The McIntosh County Shouters)
Slave Shout Songs from the Coast of Georgia
Ring Shout Recording from the Library of Congress McIntosh County Shouters: Gullah-Geechee Ring Shout from Georgia
Books
Jabir, Johari. Conjuring Freedom : Music and Masculinity in the Civil War’s “Gospel Army.” Columbus : The Ohio State University Press, 2017. (Focuses specifically upon the 1st South Carolina Volunteers’ Ring Shout during the Civil War.)
Rosenbaum, Art, and Johann S. Buis. Shout Because You’re Free : The African American Ring Shout Tradition in Coastal Georgia. University of Georgia Press, 1998.