Pitt Professor, Historian, and Author Marcus Rediker to Give a Presentation on and Sign His New Book, "The Slave Ship: A Human History," Oct. 4

PITTSBURGH-Thirty years of research in maritime archives laid the groundwork for University of Pittsburgh Professor of History Marcus Rediker's new book, "The Slave Ship: A Human History" (Viking Penguin, 2007), to be released Oct. 4, with a presentation and book signing to be held at 6 p.m. that day in The Book Center, 4000 Fifth Ave., Oakland.

Advance registration is requested; to RSVP for the free Oct. 4 event or for more information, call 412-648-1453.

In "The Slave Ship," Rediker said he set out to describe "what it meant to live in a wooden world." According to Rediker, what had happened on the slave ship informed what resulted on land. "It was a social and cultural process that changed people," he explained. And the repercussions from that process still resonate today.

From the book's jacket: "This is a tale of tragedy and terror, but also an epic of resilience, survival, and the creation of something entirely new, something that could only be called African American. Marcus Rediker restores the slave ship to its rightful place alongside the plantation as a formative institution of slavery, as a place where a profound and still-haunting history of race, class, and modern capitalism was made."

At Pitt since 1994, Rediker is the author of "Villains of All Nations: Atlantic Pirates in the Golden Age" (Beacon Press/Verso, 2004); "The Many-Headed Hydra: Sailors, Slaves, Commoners, and the Hidden History of the Revolutionary Atlantic" (Beacon Press/Verso, 2000); "Who Built America? Working People and the Nation's Economy, Politics, Culture, and Society," Volume 1 (Pantheon Books, 1989); and "Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea: Merchant Seamen, Pirates, and the Anglo-American Maritime World, 1700-1750" (Cambridge University Press, 1987).

Rediker's writings have been translated into French, German, Greek, Italian, Korean, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, and Swedish. His many honors include a 2001 International Labor History Book Prize, a 1988 Merle Curti Social History Book Award, and a 1988 John Hope Franklin Book Prize. He has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the American Council of Learned Societies, and the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation. In addition, the Organization of American Historians named him Distinguished Lecturer for 2002 through 2008.

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