Ryan Skinner (Associate Professor, AAAS & Music) recently published his second scholarly monograph, Afro-Sweden: Becoming Black in a Color-Blind Country (Minnesota, 2022). The first book-length study in English to focus on the African and Black diaspora in Sweden, Afro-Sweden emphasizes the voices, experiences, practices, knowledge, and ideas of these communities. Its interdisciplinary approach to understanding African diasporans in Sweden is essential to contemporary conversations around such issues as the status and identity of racialized populations in Europe and the international impact of Black Lives Matter. 

In a review of the book, Benjamin Teitelbaum (Associate Professor, CU Boulder) writes, “A remarkable work in both its content and style, Afro-Sweden compels us to reconsider our understandings of race, place, and identity, all while highlighting the presence of a population whose cultural vitality and roots are too often overlooked.”

Skinner also received a TOME grant from the Ohio State University Libraries to support an open access digital publication of Afro-Sweden, which will be available in September.