Books by Sandy Alexandre

Focuses on two connected issues: representations of lynching in late-nineteenth and twentieth-century American photographs, poetry, and fiction; and the effects of those representations. Alexandre compellingly shows how putting representations of lynching in dialogue with the history of lynching uncovers the profound investment of African American literature.

This book looks at the role fictional and actual material things play in black-American literature and culture, exploring the ethical implications of black thinghood on how African Americans empathize with, organize, and deploy objects. Visiting the role of race in studying thing theory, it considers American literature, art, slavery, and the process of simultaneously racializing and moralizing both material objects and desire. It argues that significance placed on objects like heirlooms, inventions, and packed suitcases constitutes an unexamined branch of black subjectivity, perseverance, and innovation, challenging the fields of object-oriented ontology, thing theory, and new materialism.