Warmest congratulations to my former colleague Shantel A. George, whose intriguing book The Yoruba Are on A Rock: Recaptured Africans and the Orisas of Grenada (Cambridge University Press, 2025) will be “on the shelves” in September!
The author writes, “This book is based on over thirty interviews with cultural workers and descendants of recaptured Africans and archival documents in Grenada, the UK, and the US. I hope that this book will increase the awareness of African-heritage religions in Grenada and the wider African diaspora, and document the resilience, knowledge, and memories of religious custodians and descendants of recaptured Africans for future generations.”
Description: The Yoruba Are on a Rock focuses on the Africans who arrived in Grenada decades after the abolition of the British slave trade and how they radically shaped the religious and cultural landscape of the island. Rooted in extensive archival and ethnographic research, Shantel A. George carefully traces and unpacks the complex movements of people and ideas between various points in western Africa and the Eastern Caribbean to argue that Orisa worship in Grenada is not, as has been generally supposed, a residue of recaptive Yoruba peoples, but emerged from dynamic and multi-layered exchanges within and beyond Grenada. Further, the book shows how recaptives pursued freedom by drawing on shared African histories and experiences in the homeland and in Grenada, and recovers intriguing individual biographies of the recaptives, their descendants, and religious custodians. By historicising this island’s little-known and fascinating tradition, the book advances our knowledge of African diaspora cultures and histories.
- Documents Grenada’s little-known and fascinating Orisa tradition and the memories of the descendants of recaptives and cultural custodians
- Charts the intersecting histories, adherents, beliefs, and practices of African-derived religious communities
- Rethinks Black Atlantic religious practice by investigating the inter-island presence and relationships African descendants created within in the eastern Caribbean
- Demonstrates the prestige and vitality of Yoruba culture in the Caribbean
Shantel A. George is Lecturer in History at the University of Glasgow. Her research focuses on African-derived cultures and identities in the British Caribbean and the global circulation of African commodities. This is her first book.
For more information, see https://www.cambridge.org/gb/universitypress/subjects/history/atlantic-history/yoruba-are-rock-recaptured-africans-and-orisas-grenada