Tess Chakkalakal

Affiliation: Africana Studies, English
Associate Professor of Africana Studies and English

Tess Chakkalakal [pronounced “Chah-KAHL-ickle”] has published widely on nineteenth-century African American and American literature. She is the author of Novel Bondage: Slavery, Marriage, and Freedom in Nineteenth-Century America (Illinois, 2011) which earned the Robert K. Martin Prize for best book on American literature and "a must read" title by Choice. She is co-editor of Jim Crow, Literature, and the Legacy of Sutton E. Griggs (Georgia, 2013). She is also co-editor of Imperium in Imperio by Sutton E. Griggs: A Critical Edition (West Virginia Press, 2022).

Professor Chakkalakal has earned fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Social Science and Humanities Research Council, Duke University, Emory University, and the Mellon Foundation. Chakkalakal is founder/faculty director of the Stowe Writers Collective at Bowdoin College.

Book Cover      Jim Crow Literature Chakkalakal Book Cover Image     Chakkalakal Novel Bondage Book Cover Image.

Left to right: Book covers for Imperium in Imperio by Sutton E. Griggs: A Critical EditionJim Crow, Literature, and the Legacy of Sutton E. Griggs, and Novel Bondage: Slavery, Marriage, and Freedom in Nineteenth-Century America.

Tess Chakkalakal Headshot

Education

  • PhD, York University
  • MA, York University
  • BA, University of Toronto