Tess Chakkalakal is Associate Professor of Africana Studies and English at Bowdoin College. She is the author of Novel Bondage: Slavery, Marriage, and Freedom in Nineteenth- Centur...view moreTess Chakkalakal is Associate Professor of Africana Studies and English at Bowdoin College. She is the author of Novel Bondage: Slavery, Marriage, and Freedom in Nineteenth- Century America. She is the coeditor of Jim Crow, Literature, and the Legacy of Sutton E. Griggs and Imperium in Imperio by Sutton E. Griggs: A Critical Edition. She is currently at work on a biography of Charles W. Chesnutt, a portion of which has been published in J19. She serves on the editorial team for The Complete Writings of Charles W. Chesnutt, forthcoming from Oxford University Press.view less