A bit late but it's been somewhat hectic. When RTs or notifications re historical studies about Black people and early modern England cross my TL, I find it difficult to sit silently in the face of erasures. 1/
[image: Madeline Kahn saying flames]

#BlackHistoryMonthUK caveat: I am an academic but not “British.” However, my academic research is on pre/early modern English culture/literature/societies and I write extensively on Blackness and “race” in Renaissance/early modern English culture. 2/

This thread is a reminder that "everything old is new again,” especially to historian naysayers who have newly "discovered" the study of race in pre-1700 English culture. News flash: It's been done as early as the 1970s. 3/

Why do I bother? Genealogies vs Gatekeeping. Erasure and Misrepresentation because academic folks late to the game want to claim the invention of the game. Finally, I have much else to do since I don’t teach anymore (okay, that's an untruth ...) 4/

There is a generation of pre/early modern academics unaware “premodern critical race studies” predates 2005, or that non-white scholars are/were the most influential voices on discussions of Black people and race in pre-1700 England. 5/

Like the oracle, I’m here to lift the veil of confusion. The reading list I promised is in no way definitive (which means you really should read the bibliographies) but definitive is not what is needed at the moment. Just a loud voice. 6/

As promised a reading list. For scholars interested in "premodern critical race studies" consider these studies foundational genealogies. When you open a book or essay on race or Black peoples in early modern England go the bibliography. 7/

Check citations, engagements with or lack thereof with the author(s') work, compare the number of cited white authors writing about "race" or Black people to the non-white authors, and look at the book/essay author's previous work. It can be revealing. 8/

Irony: There was a time when Black, Brown, and Native graduate students who wanted to focus on premodern "race" issues were told “you won’t get a job if you focus on such a niche or irrelevant topic.” Even so, some of us chose to ignore the advice. 9/

We did the work most historians refused to do: Entered the archives, searched for the “presence” of Black peoples” in Britain long before the trans-Atlantic trade in enslaved Africans, found the documents, and wrote our dissertations and articles. 10/

Along the way, we discovered the marginalized books of White-English born James Walvin, Dominica-born Edward Scobie, Nigerian-born F. O. Shyllon, Kenyan-born Jagdish Gundara and White-English born Ian Duffield, 11/

and White-English born (Marxist journalist) Peter Fryer. We were inspired and challenged by the works of Black scholars like Eldred Jones’ Othello’s Countrymen (1965) and Anthony Barthelemy’s Black Face, Maligned Race (1987). 12/

Premodern critical race studies came into being because Black scholars (mostly US-born) fought for its existence, even in the face of UK/US academic resistance (despite the research by Walvin, Scobie, Shyllon, Gundara and Duffield, and Fryer). 13/

Which is why I do my once every couple of months Twitter “reminder.” Research on Black people in early modern England and Premodern critical race studies existed long before a book titled “Black Tudors” came onto the landscape. 14/

It is insulting that the scholarship of Imtiaz Habib has been ignored, overlooked, and erased in favor of a work clearly indebted to Habib’s research. That pre-1990 studies aren't acknowledged for paving the way for historians such as MK. 15/

It is a slight to Dr. Habib's memory that a “petition” had to be launched to see “Black Lives in the English Archives, 1500-1677” in paperback so the "archives" are readily available for study. It is insulting that so much research 16/

on Black people in pre/early modern England is effaced or slighted. That Gretchen Gerzina’s Black England and Black Victorians exists as "evidence" of "Black English lives" yet in historical romance this fact is subject to question. 17/

Academic gatekeepers and naysayers have done writers a disservice since archival-based documentation about Blacks in pre-1700 UK has long been available. So I say STFU to all “romance historical accuracy or authenticity” naysayers. The archives don't lie. 18/

Importantly, for Romancelandia’s Black and Brown historical romance authors who aren’t academics, scholars of color have done the work for you on England’s “Black” history. Write your stories and if you aren't sure, ask. "We" got your back. 19/

The resistance to critical race theory in pre/early modern fields unless it is filtered through a white lens remains a signficant form of gatekeeping on all levels, academic and non-academic. It needs to stop now. 20/

[image: Prince shaking his head]

I'm someone whose academic career centers on "race" and Black peoples in 16th/17th centuries English culture. I don't need to see RTs of "late to the 'race' table" white historians' texts on my TL, especially when it's a rehash. I know the genealogy 21/

a generation of historians marginally acknowledged or elided; recall their dismissal of the value of the research; felt the sting of criticism when we insisted otherwise. Perhaps this might seem petty, but 21st century pre/early modern white historians 22/

and literary scholars don't get to posture their "credentials" over an area of research, premodern critical race studies, their disciplines resisted or slighted for several decades. ~ Margo Hendricks (*I'm writing this at 12:52 am. Any typos... )