Christensen - Rastafari reasoning and the Rastawoman: gender constructions in the shaping of Rastafari livity

The Critical Africana Studies book series features critical, interdisciplinary, and intersectional scholarship within the emerging field of Africana studies. Most scholars within the field agree that Africana studies is essentially a rubric term utilized to conceptually capture the teaching and research of a wide range of intellectuals (both academic and organic intellectuals) working in disciplines or subdisciplines as discursively diverse as: African studies, African diasporan studies, African American studies, Afro-American studies, Afro-Asian studies, Afro-European studies, Afro-Islamic studies, Afro-Jewish studies, Afro-Latino studies, Afro-Native American studies, Caribbean studies, Pan-African studies, Black British studies and, of course, Black studies. Epistemological and methodological advances in Africana studies, as well as historical and cultural changes, over the last fifty years have led to an increased interest in continental and diasporan African history, culture, thought, and struggles. The Critical Africana Studies book series directly responds to the heightened demand for monographs and edited volumes that innovatively explore Africa and its diaspora employing cutting-edge critical, interdisciplinary, and intersectional theory and methods.

Authors and editors in this series are Africana studies and other scholars whose work decidedly challenges the notion that Africana studies is merely another name for racial and ethnic studies. Much more, Africana studiesat least, as conceived of within the world of this seriesinvolves identifying the most pressing problems confronting, and the most viable solutions offered to Africa and its diaspora, especially African America. Therefore, to state the obvious: people of African origin or descent seek to grasp and grapple with a lot more than race and the harrowing realities of racism. The political economies of colonialism and capitalism equally come into play. Sexism, heterosexism, and black sexual politics are also extremely important variables that must be taken into consideration. In addition, religious affiliation, ecological devastation, immigration, nationalism, transnationalism, and transculturalism have only intensified continental and diasporan African issues and identities throughout the colonial, neocolonial, and so-called postcolonial periods.

All of this means that a wide range of epistemologies and methodologies need to be employed in our efforts to critically comprehend the contradictions and complexities of what it means to be African in light of the onslaught and aftermath of the African holocaust, racial colonization, enslavement, and various forms of apartheid (including American apartheid). Consequently, the books in this series decidedly move beyond one-dimensional and monodisciplinary theories and methods and utilize mixed methodologies and multiple epistemologiesfrom those arising from traditional single-subject focused disciplines like history, philosophy, sociology, psychology, and political science, to those emanating from newly established or emerging multidisciplinary or, rather, transdisciplinary fields such as American studies, womens studies, sexuality studies, cultural studies, and postcolonial studies. Ultimately, it is the unrepentant and insurgent interdisciplinarity and intersectionality of the books in this series that distinguish it from other African studies, African diasporan studies, African American studies, Caribbean studies, or Black Studies book series.

Reiland Rabaka, Series Editor