Then We'll Sing a New Song
African Influences on America's Religious Landscape
By (author) Mary Ann Clark
Publication date:
10 May 2012Length of book:
242 pagesPublisher
Rowman & Littlefield PublishersISBN-13: 9781442208797
Then We'll Sing a New Song is a fascinating examination of how African religions have shaped belief and practices in America. Not just the story of the development of African American religions or the black church, this book tells the often-unrecognized, but important story of how African religions have shaped religion in America more broadly.
Mary Ann Clark introduces readers to the cultures of three African kingdoms that contributed significant numbers of their population to the African slave trade, and also profoundly shaped religion in America—the Kingdom of Kongo, the Oyo Empire, and the Kingdom of Dahomey. Each of these groups has a unique history within the long history of the Atlantic slave trade and interacts with the Americas at a specific point in history. Clark shows how each may have had an influence on contemporary American beliefs and culture, sometimes in surprising ways. The book features a glossary, timeline, and maps.
Mary Ann Clark introduces readers to the cultures of three African kingdoms that contributed significant numbers of their population to the African slave trade, and also profoundly shaped religion in America—the Kingdom of Kongo, the Oyo Empire, and the Kingdom of Dahomey. Each of these groups has a unique history within the long history of the Atlantic slave trade and interacts with the Americas at a specific point in history. Clark shows how each may have had an influence on contemporary American beliefs and culture, sometimes in surprising ways. The book features a glossary, timeline, and maps.
The last few years have seen a continuing and important reevaluation of the black experience of Christianity in America; this contribution by independent scholar Clark (religious studies, Univ. of Houston, Clear Lake) is one of the more readable and thoughtful studies. In well-researched chapters, Clark shows the profound and distinctive contributions of three of the African regions from which many slaves were brought to the New World: the kingdom of Kongo, the Oyo empire, and the kingdom of Dahomey. VERDICT A brief, concise, and flowingly written narrative of some of the most telling components of black religion in America, this book will be a fine introduction for the general reader, as well as a resource for black churches and university courses.