This slim booklet presents the text of a speech said to have been delivered in Virginia in 1712 by a slaveholder named Willie Lynch, describing a method of controlling enslaved Africans for centuries by setting them against one another โ old against young, light against dark, male against female. It circulates widely as an explanation for divisions within Black communities today. Because no original document has ever been produced and historians widely regard the letter as a modern fabrication, it belongs on the shelf as an influential text to be read with a critical eye.
Author: Attributed to "Willie Lynch"; the widely distributed modern edition is edited by Kashif Malik Hassan-El ยท Original publisher: Lushena Books (Chicago), 1999
