Edda L. Fields-Black
Edda L. Fields-Black | |
|---|---|
Fields-Black in March 2024 | |
| Born | Edda L. Fields |
| Occupations | Historian, Professor, Author |
| Spouse | Samuel Black |
| Awards | Pulitzer Prize for History (2025) Gilder Lehrman Lincoln Prize (2025) Tom Watson Brown Book Award (2025) |
| Academic background | |
| Alma mater | Emory University (BA) University of Florida (MA) University of Pennsylvania (MA, PhD) |
| Thesis | Rice farmers in the Rio Nunez region: A social history of agricultural technology and identity in coastal Guinea, ca. 2000 BCE to 1880 CE (2001) |
| Doctoral advisor | Steven Feierman |
| Academic work | |
| Institutions | Carnegie Mellon University (2001–present) |
| Main interests | West African rice agriculture and peasant rice farmers, Rio Nunez languages, slavery on antebellum rice plantations, African diaspora, Civil War history, Gullah history and culture |
| Notable works | COMBEE: Harriet Tubman, the Combahee River Raid, and Black Freedom during the Civil War (2024) Deep Roots: Rice Farmers in West Africa and the African Diaspora (2008) |
| Notable ideas | Rice cultivation technology transfer from West Africa to the Americas |
| Website | eddafieldsblack |
Edda L. Fields-Black is an American historian who is Professor of History and Director of the Dietrich College Humanities Center at Carnegie Mellon University. She won the 2025 Pulitzer Prize in History for her book COMBEE: Harriet Tubman, the Combahee River Raid, and Black Freedom during the Civil War. She is known for her transnational work on West African rice agriculture and societies, the African diaspora, and Gullah culture.