Tess Chakkalakal is a professor of Africana Studies and English at Bowdoin College who is known for her work as an American biographer and writer.
Education and career Chakkalakal has a B.A. from the University of Toronto, and she earned an M.A. and a Ph.D. from York University. As of 2025, she is a professor of Africana Studies and English at Bowdoin College.She previously taught at Williams College, Bowling Green State University, and Texas A & M International University
She is co-host and creator of Dead Writers: A Podcast About Great American Authors and Where They Lived.
Selected publications
Novel Bondage: Slavery, Marriage, and Freedom in Nineteenth-Century America (Illinois, 2011) Reviews of Novel Bondage Jim Crow, Literature, and the Legacy of Sutton E. Griggs (Georgia, 2013). Reviews of Jim Crow, Literature, and the Legacy of Sutton E. Griggs Imperium in Imperio by Sutton E. Griggs: A Critical Edition (West Virginia Press, 2022). A Matter of Complexion: The Life and Fictions of Charles W. Chesnutt (St. Martin’s Press, 2025) Reviews of A Matter of Complexion
References
External links Tess Chakkalakal | Bowdoin College