Book Recommendation: Afro-Latin America, 1800–2000

Marveta Ryan-Sams

Associate Professor

What’s a book you would recommend to someone who wanted to learn more about your area of expertise?

Here in the United States, we are familiar with how people of African descent came to be in this country and their impact on our nation’s development. Few of us are aware, however, that large numbers of Africans were brought to the Spanish and Portuguese colonies of Latin America, and that people of African descent have profoundly influenced that region’s history and culture. For this reason, I recommend the book Afro-Latin America, 1800–2000. This book, by historian George Reid Andrews, explains how African-descended peoples transitioned from slavery to freedom and actively contributed to the economic, political, social, and cultural life of their respective nations.   

Marveta Ryan-Sams is an associate professor of Spanish. She teaches courses in language and composition, as well as Hispanic-American and Caribbean literature and culture. She completed her doctorate in Hispanic literatures at Harvard University in 1999.

Afro-Latin America, 1800–2000

George Reid Andrews

Oxford University Press, 2004