African American category: 7736 books

In 1793 James F. Brown was born a slave, and in 1868 he died a free man. At age 34 he ran away from his native Maryland to pass the remainder of his life as a gardener to a wealthy family in the Hudson Valley. Two years after his escape and manumission, he began a diary which he kept until his death....

Sales of S&S paperback edition: The New Press has taken paperback rights back from S&S, who sold over fifteen thousand copies. New Preface: Updates the conversation in light of the Trump presidency and the re-remembering of slavery and the civil war that the national reckoning with...

How hip hop shapes our conversations about race--and how race influences our consideration of hip hop Hip hop is a distinctive form of black art in America-from Tupac to the Pulitzer Prize-winning Kendrick Lamar, hip hop has long given voice to the African American experience. As scholar and...

Apart from a handful of exotic--and almost completely unreliable--tales surrounding his life, Richard Potter is almost unknown today. Two hundred years ago, however, he was the most popular entertainer in America--the first showman, in fact, to win truly nationwide fame. Working as a magician and...

In this “captivating saga” of the post-Reconstruction era, a black female journalist blazes her own trail—“unforgettable; gripping; an instant classic” (Elle).   Ivoe Williams, the precocious daughter of a Muslim cook and a metalsmith from central-east Texas, discovers a lifelong obsession...

An African American centenarian who saw W. E. B. Du Bois speak in 1924 and attended President Barack Obama’s inauguration in 2009 shares wisdom from a life well lived during a crucial period in American history Ella Mae Cheeks Johnson was an inspirational, dynamic, and one-of-a-kind woman,...

Dialect poems by one of the nineteenth century's most talented African American lyricists Paul Laurence Dunbar was “the most promising young colored man” in nineteenth-century America, according to Frederick Douglass, and subsequently one of the most controversial. His plantation lyrics,...

A poetic reimagining of the life of Booker T. Washington that explores issues of being an African American male of note at the beginning of the twentieth century.

**Finalist for the National Book Award in Poetry Brutal Imagination is the work of a poet at the peak of his considerable powers, confronting a crucial subject: the black man in America. “A hymn to all the sons this country has stolen from her African-American families.”—The Village...

Malcolm X gave black Americans not only their consciousness, but their history, their dignity, and a new pride. No single individual can claim a more important responsibility for a sociological and historical leap forward such as the one sparked in America in the 1960s. In 1965, when Malcolm X was...

Here's your invitation to join a literary as well as a personal relationship with the deeply insightful and profoundly expressive perspectives of Regina Diane Jemison. As you encounter these soul-stirring pieces, you may imagine listening to one of God's own trombones. The poetry, prose and personality...

*THE INAUGURAL SARAH JESSICA PARKER PICK FOR BOOK CLUB CENTRAL* CHOSEN AS A 2017 BEST SUMMER READ PICK BY The Wall Street Journal • The Washington Post • The Seattle Times NAMED ONE OF THE MOST ANTICIPATED BOOKS OF 2017 BY Entertainment Weekly • Nylon • Elle •...

In 1962 the poet, musician, and performer Maya Angelou claimed another piece of her identity by moving to Ghana, joining a community of "Revolutionist Returnees" inspired by the promise of pan-Africanism. All God's Children Need Walking Shoes is her lyrical and acutely perceptive exploration...

**A National Book Foundation 5 Under 35 Honoree NBCC John Leonard First Book Prize Finalist Aspen Words Literary Prize Finalist California Book Award First Fiction Finalist Hurston/Wright Legacy Award Debut Novel Nominee Longlisted for the Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction & the Brooklyn...