Adriana Chira, Patchwork Freedoms: Law, Slavery, and Race Beyond Cuba's Plantations Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2022. Pp. 320. $102.95 hardcover (ISBN 9781108499545); $33.95 paperback (ISBN 9781108730808); $24 ebook (ISBN 9781108606677).

Abstract

A patchwork is made up of many bits of cloth of different colors, materials, and patterns woven together to beautiful effect. That is an accurate metaphor for the careful work that Adriana Chira has done in Patchwork Freedoms: Law, Slavery, and Race Beyond Cuba ’ s Plantations . She has stitched together bits of information found in various sources and forged a cutting-edge argument about the making of law in Santiago de Cuba, where long-standing, custom-based manumission practices and widespread popular legalism crafted an enti-tled peasantry of African descent in the region. Chira ’ s findings are based on a meticulous analysis of court cases, testaments, manumission papers, parish records, official correspondence, and juridical writings.