James H. Sweet is Vilas-Jartz distinguished professor of history at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His research interests range widely across the history of Africa and the African diaspora. He is the author of two prize-winning books, Recreating Africa: Culture, Kinship, and Religion in the African-Portuguese World, 1441-1770 (2003) and Domingos Álvares, African Healing, and the Intellectual History of the Atlantic World (2011). His third book, Mutiny on the Black Prince: Slavery, Piracy, and the Limits of Liberty in the Revolutionary Atlantic World, was published by Oxford University Press in 2025. He is currently working on a fourth book project, Redemption Song: An Intellectual and Political History of Atlantic Africa, 1441 to 1867. Sweet is a former president of the American Historical Association, the largest organization of its kind in the world, and the oldest historians’ organization in the United States. He is a co-editor of a book series on Africa and the Diaspora for the University of Wisconsin Press. Additionally, he serves on the advisory board for “Save or Enslave: Religion and Slavery in the Portuguese Seaborne Empire, 1452–1741,” a research project based at the University of Coimbra in Portugal.

Contact:

jhsweet@wisc.edu

UW Madison – Department of History
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Madison, WI 53706