“Feather-Bed Resistance” and Racial Vindication in Eslanda Goode Robeson’s African Journey

Eslanda Goode Robeson (1895–1965) is relatively absent from discussions of Black women in anthropology. Though an American, she studied at the London School of Economics with Bronisław Malinowski, conducted fieldwork in Africa (as many of his students at the time did), and published African Journey (1945) based on this research. This article analyzes this monograph, alongside archival material, to provide evidence of how Robeson exercised “feather-bed resistance” while navigating the white spaces of the British academy and publishing world. Additionally, her description of fieldwork in Uganda demonstrates the role of racial vindication in Robeson’s portrayal of herself and her interlocutors. Drawing on Zora Neale Hurston’s Mules and Men, I conceptualize feather-bed resistance as a practice of engaging with the project of anthropology while challenging the discipline’s role in producing and giving credence to anti-Black discourse. I argue that through acts of feather-bed resistance, Robeson used the epistemic power of anthropology to position herself as an expert through her writing on Africa while also using her expertise to form counternarratives to claims of African inferiority.