African American Studies

In this searing classic autobiography, originally published in 1965, Malcolm X, the Muslim leader, firebrand, and Black empowerment activist, tells the extraordinary story of his life and the growth of the Human Rights movement....

In this beautifully written masterwork, Pulitzer Prize–winning author Isabel Wilkerson presents a definitive and dramatic account of one of the great untold stories of American history: the Great Migration of six million Black citizens who fled the South for the North and West....

A blueprint. A bible. What Sun Tzu’s Art of War was to ancient China, Pimp is to the streets. As real as you can get without jumping in, this is the story of Iceberg Slim’s life as he saw, felt, tasted, and smelled it.

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER A dramatic expansion of a groundbreaking work of journalism, The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story offers a profoundly revealing vision of the American past and present. NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY The Washington Post NPR Marie Claire In...

A major literary event: a never-before-published work from the author of the American classic Their Eyes Were Watching God that brilliantly illuminates the horror and injustices of slavery as it tells the true story of one of the last known survivors of the Atlantic slave trade—abducted from...

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER From the governor of Maryland, the “compassionate” (People), “startling” (Baltimore Sun), “moving” (Chicago Tribune) true story of two kids with the same name: One went on to be a Rhodes Scholar, decorated combat veteran, White House Fellow, and...

This compelling #1 New York Times bestseller examines the legacy of slavery in America—and how both history and memory continue to shape our everyday lives. Beginning in his hometown of New Orleans, Clint Smith leads the reader on an unforgettable tour of monuments and landmarks—those that...

Scholars of US and transatlantic slavery have largely ignored or dismissed accusations that Black Americans were cannibalized. Vincent Woodard takes the enslaved person's claims of human consumption seriously, focusing on both the starvation of the slave and the tropes of cannibalism on the part...

The phenomenal true story of the black female mathematicians at NASA whose calculations helped fuel some of America’s greatest achievements in space. Soon to be a major motion picture starring Taraji P. Henson, Octavia Spencer, Janelle Monae, Kirsten Dunst, and Kevin Costner. Before John Glenn...

Sundown Towns examines thousands of all-white American towns that were - and still are, in some instances - racially exclusive by design. Professor emeritus at the University of Vermont, James W. Loewen won the National Book Award for his New York Times best seller Lies My Teacher Told Me...

rst published in 1903, this collection of 15 essays dared to describe the racism that prevailed at that time in America—and to demand an end to it. The Souls of Black Folk is a classic in the literature of civil rights....

Few modern voices have had as profound an impact on the black identity and critical race theory as Frantz Fanon, and Black Skin, White Masks represents some of his most important work. Fanon's masterwork is now available in a new translation that updates its language for a new generation of...

In July 2004, Barack Obama electrified the Democratic National Convention with an address that spoke to Americans across the political spectrum. Now, in The Audacity of Hope, Senator Obama calls for a different brand of politics–a politics for those weary of bitter partisanship and alienated...

From the award-winning, New York Times best-selling author of White Rage, the startling - and timely - history of voter suppression in America, with a foreword by Senator Dick Durbin....

A century after Appomattox, the civil rights movement won full citizenship for black Americans in the South. It should not have been necessary: by 1870 those rights were set in the Constitution. This is the story of the terrorist campaign that took them away. Nicholas Lemann opens his...

The American political scene today is poisonously divided, and the vast majority of white evangelicals plays a strikingly unified, powerful role in the disunion. These evangelicals raise a starkly consequential question for electoral politics: Why do they claim morality while supporting...

Born to a poor couple who were tenant farmers on a plantation in Mississippi, Anne Moody lived through some of the most dangerous days of the pre-civil rights era in the South. The week before she began high school came the news of Emmet Till's lynching. Before then, she had "known the fear of...

In Teaching Critical Thinking, renowned cultural critic and progressive educator Bell Hooks addresses some of the most compelling issues facing teachers in and out of the classroom today.

A classic work of feminist scholarship, Ain't I a Woman has become a must for all those interested in the nature of Black womanhood. Examining the impact of sexism on Black women during slavery, the devaluation of Black womanhood, Black male sexism, racism among feminists, and the Black woman's...

An unapologetic look into the factors that have caused so many Blacks to think and act in the negative way they do towards themselves and others....

FINALIST, LA TIMES BOOK PRIZE IN AUDIOBOOK NAMED A MOST ANTICIPATED BOOK BY: Time, USA Today, People, AARP, Today.com, BookRiot, Bustle, LitHub, BookPage, Our Culture, and Vulture A surprising and beautiful meditation on the color blue—and its fascinating role in Black history and...

Presenting the essential writings of black lesbian poet and feminist writer Audre Lorde, Sister Outsider celebrates an influential voice in 20th-century literature. In this charged collection of 15 essays and speeches, Lorde takes on sexism, racism, ageism, homophobia, and class and propounds...

Katrina Hazzard-Donald explores African Americans' experience and practice of the herbal, healing folk belief tradition known as Hoodoo. Working against conventional scholarship, the author argues that Hoodoo emerged first in three distinct regions she calls "regional Hoodoo clusters"....

The cross and the lynching tree are the two most emotionally charged symbols in the history of the African American community. In this powerful work, theologian James H. Cone explores these symbols and their interconnection in the history and souls of black folk...

In the tradition of The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, this New York Times bestseller is a page-turning account of one of the nation’s last segregated asylums. "A book that left me breathless." —Clint Smith, New York Times bestselling author of How The Word Is Passed "Fascinating." —The...

What does it mean to say that Black is an ethnicity and American is a nationality? This book confronts that question directly, challenging assumptions that have long gone unexamined. It argues that Black identity is not a vague label or a social convenience, but a distinct cultural and historical inheritance shaped by shared experience, memory, and creative expression. Through history, law, culture, and lived reality, this work traces how Black identity in America developed as something far more than a category imposed from the outside. It is a peoplehood forged through struggle, resilience...

A vibrant new vision of food justice that celebrates Black food and recognizes the power of gathering to create sustainable, systemic change. How can we create a world where everyone has enough? We can start by focusing less on lack and more on abundance. In Gather, anthropologist Ashanté M...

Most people associate Hill Harper with Hollywood, as he’s appeared in dozens of films and television shows. But he is just as comfortable in a school auditorium, rousing groups of students with his unique style of real-life wisdom. Having addressed thousands of high-school and middle- school...

Following the end of the Civil War, Mississippians responded to broader movements in the country, to changes in the economy, and to congressional initiatives as they worked to recover from the devastation of war and pursue new expressions of freedom. Reconstruction in Mississippi, 1862-1877 is a compelling account of how Black Mississippians embraced this freedom and how white Mississippians could not.

In Representative American Negroes, Paul Laurence Dunbar steps away from fiction to present a series of powerful, intimate portraits of men and women who met the challenges of their era with unyielding dignity and brilliant intellect. Writing with the precision of a historian and the soul of a poet, Dunbar captures more than biography—he captures the spirit of an era. These sketches reflect perseverance in the face of prejudice and quiet distinction in an age of loud opposition.