Going Underground

“Lara Langer Cohen ingeniously weaves together a capacious range of underexplored materials to bring alive the concept of ‘the underground’ in its many instantiations. We descend with Cohen to new depths as she deftly shows these undergrounds to be at once place, practice, and cultural formation, all of which gesture to the powerful potential of the unknowable and unfathomable to undermine the world as we know it and lead us to new paradigms of existence.” - Jayna Brown, author of Black Utopias: Speculative Life and the Music of Other Worlds

“When was the last time you saw spelunking, sex magic, the Underground Railroad, secret societies, and political subversion all in the same book? In this fascinating and delicious study Lara Langer Cohen offers a genealogical tracing of the origins and impact of the now commonplace trope of the underground and a stunning archival exhumation of the broad array of political fantasies animated by it. Cohen’s political instincts are nothing if not commanding, and her suggestion that her book might inspire its readers to summon associations with other undergrounds for activation in the present is a mark of her generosity and contemporary commitment.” - Eric Lott, author of Black Mirror: The Cultural Contradictions of American Racism

"A fascinating book . . . that shines an important light on the building of an established concept." - Omari Averette-Phillips, World History Encyclopedia

“The details that Going Underground recovers establish the underground as a significant site of 19th-century American thought and will certainly interest readers concerned with histories of race, literature, and the political imagination. By following where the subterranean leads, Cohen highlights overlooked thinkers such as [Paschal Beverly] Randolph while offering fresh perspectives on well-known figures and scenes.” - Madeline Zehnder, Public Books

“Race is the underground to the underground for Cohen. Whether terrifying or emancipatory, these undergrounds are sites of speculative and imaginative fervor. Cohen navigates these shifting meanings of the ‘underground’ with deliberation and nuance.” - Jonathan Elmer, American Literary History

"Going Underground is an important study that speaks to scholars in the fields of literary and cultural studies, Black geographies, and history, among others. What is more, in its centering of the underground as political imagination, the book also affords its readers the space to 'attend less to what did happen than to what could have happened'." - Nicole Waller, Nineteenth-Century Contexts