Racism and racial discrimination Books

Book SynopsisSocial work education and interventions with Black African families are frequently impaired because of structural discrimination and racism. Rooted in rich empirical work with practitioners and educators, this urgent, scholarly and accessible book emphasises that Black Lives Matter'.Trade Review"This book invites an honest, respectful, and critical rumination on social work theory and practice with Black Africans in western countries…It seeks to fuse multiple perspectives and philosophies on the disempowerment of the Black African diaspora because of universalised European hierarchies of power within and beyond the social work profession. In short, it is a very important intellectual work. Indeed, it is…probably the only book of this kind currently available." Critical Social Policy ‘It is energising to see writers articulate how their positionality and political commitment influence their academic interests and writings…I am a Black American trained social worker who grew up in the state’s care with more than half a dozen social workers assigned to my case throughout my childhood. This book affected me and gave me hope because it provides theoretical tools for progressive educators and practitioners to promote a greater awareness of ‘social change’ within social work education and training’. Antoine Rogers, Ethics and Social Welfare, 2023 ‘This book, Social Work with the Black African Diaspora, is a welcome addition to the library of emerging African social work scholars in western societies. It is a well-overdue contribution to combatting age-long racial and political knowledge in social work. Although the book is focused on Ireland, its theoretical terrain has significant resonance for the profession, society and, most importantly, policymakers worldwide’. Oluwagbemiga Oyinlola, Aotearoa New Zealand Social Work, 2023"This work expands social work education and explicitly centres diverse, global multicultural theoretical voices, including those platforming economic liberation-orientated concepts and paradigms. As a former service user and a practitioner, I believe this knowledge makes for better social workers." Ethics and Social WelfareTable of Contents1. Introduction 2. Keywords, concepts and terminology 3. Decolonising theory 4. Afrocentricity and its critics 5. Social Work in neoliberal, ‘multicultural’ Ireland 6. ‘When in Rome, you do as the Romans do’? Social work with the Black African diaspora 7. Conclusion

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Book SynopsisArising from staff and student experiences, this book offers a roadmap for senior leaders, academic and professional staff and students to build strategies, programmes and interventions that effectively dismantle racism.Table of ContentsPart 1: Introduction 1. Positioning anti-racism in higher education - Arun Verma Part 2: Staff experiences of racism 2. Academic staff experiences - Min Duchenski, Tamjid Mujtaba and Jalpa Ruparelia 3. Professional and support services staff - Claire Lee Part 3: Student experiences of racism 4. Undergraduate student experiences - Josephine Gabi and Sonia Gomes 5. Postgraduate student experiences - Arun Verma 6. Student social experiences - Zoe Nutakor Part 4: Research systems enabling racism 7. Research funding and contracts - Arun Verma 8. Research excellence assessments - Arun Verma 9. Research collaborations and publishing - Arun Verma Part 5: Teaching systems enabling racism 10. Teaching and scholarship funding, contracts and collaboration - Arun Verma 11. Teaching excellence assessments - Arun Verma Part 6: Pedagogies that enable racism 12. Pedagogies, professionalism and curricula enabling racism - Musharrat J. Ahmed-Landeryou 13. Curriculum design - Parise Carmichael-Murphy and Eileen Ggbagbo 14. University identity - Briana Coles and Arun Verma 15. Educational professionalism - Deya Mukherjee Part 7: Governance, strategy and operational systems 16. Governance and leadership - Jitesh S. B. Gajjar, Manish Maisuria and Anonymous 17. Operations and processes - Manvir Kaur Grewal 18. Strategy, planning and accountability - Shaminder Takhar, Rashid Aziz, Musharrat J. Ahmed-Landeryou and Pamela Thomas Part 8: Conclusion 19. In solidarity - Arun Verma 20. Reflections on anti-racism in higher education - Arun Verma

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Book SynopsisNew Orleans is a city that is rich in culture, music, and history. It has also long been a site of some of the most intense racially based medical inequities in the United States. Kevin McQueeney traces that inequity from the city's founding in the early eighteenth century through three centuries to the present.

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Book SynopsisNew Orleans is a city that is rich in culture, music, and history. It has also long been a site of some of the most intense racially based medical inequities in the United States. Kevin McQueeney traces that inequity from the city's founding in the early eighteenth century through three centuries to the present.

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Book SynopsisAn eloquent and thought-provoking book on racism and prejudice by the Liverpool and England football legend John Barnes.John Barnes spent the first dozen years of his life in Jamaica before moving to the UK with his family in 1975. Six years later he was a professional footballer, distinguishing himself for Watford, Liverpool and England, and in the process becoming this country''s most prominent black player.Barnes is now an articulate and captivating social commentator on a broad range of issues, and in The Uncomfortable Truth About Racism he tackles head-on the issues surrounding prejudice with his trademark intelligence and authority.By vividly evoking his personal experiences, and holding a mirror to this country''s past, present and future, Barnes provides a powerful and moving testimony. The Uncomfortable Truth About Racism will help to inform and advance the global conversation around society''s ongoing battle with the awful stainTrade ReviewBarnes has written a book which reiterates that racism is embedded in society rather than just football. -- Donald McRae * The Guardian *this book certainly feels uncomfortable, but important, too... Passionate, confrontational stuff. -- Ben East * The Guardian *brilliantly written... a genuinely important book -- Jonathan Ross * The Jonathan Ross Show *something we all need to be reading... an absolutely brilliant book... a great read for all of us -- Zoe Ball * BBC Radio 2 *an absolutely terrific book -- Susanna Reid * Good Morning Britain *[John Barnes is] such a clear thinker... well worth reading -- Richard Madeley * Good Morning Britain *

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Book SynopsisThe remarkable story of seven African-American soldiers denied the Medal of Honor for more than 50 years due to their race, and their extraordinary acts of bravery. In 1945, when Congress began reviewing the record of the most conspicuous acts of courage by American soldiers during World War II, they recommended awarding the Medal of Honor to 432 recipients. Despite the fact that more than one million African-Americans served, not a single black soldier received the Medal of Honor. The omission remained on the record for over four decades.But recent historical investigations have brought to light some of the extraordinary acts of valor performed by black soldiers during the war. Men like Vernon Baker, who single-handedly eliminated three enemy machine guns, an observation post, and a German dugout. Or Sergeant Reuben Rivers, who spearheaded his tank unit''s advance against fierce German resistance for three days despite being grievously wounded. Trade ReviewImmortal Valor tells the story of America’s unsung heroes in a moving and insightful narrative. The research is meticulous and detailed, making each character rise up off the page. * Martin J. Dugard, New York Times bestselling co-author of 'Killing Patton' *The contributions and sacrifices made by African-Americans during World War II were endless, and many times unheralded unless you served alongside and depended on these courageous men in battle. War does not discriminate, but people do. These seven Medal of Honor recipients rose above that prejudice, and this well-written book shares their incredible stories that the public needs to hear. * Tim Gray, Founder and President, The World War II Foundation *This is the only comprehensive narrative written about the African American Medal of Honor recipients of WWII to date. Extremely well written, with very little personal background on some of these men to work with, Child manages to bring each of these heroes’ stories to life on a personal level. Child carefully reconstructs each recipient’s life prior to his act of valor, demonstrating the character traits that made each an example of integrity, sacrifice and courage. This is a must-read book about seven black soldiers and their bravery at the highest level and the racial injustice that took over four decades to acknowledge. Well done! * Arthur Collins, President, 5th Platoon, the black World War II education and reenactment group *In Immortal Valor, Robert Child celebrates the lives of seven men whose valor, personal character, and love of country took them above and beyond the call of duty. We learn not just what they did to earn the Medal of Honor--an honor they were denied for far too long--but who they were as human beings, so that their examples can continue to touch us today. * Edward G. Lengel, Ph.D., Chief Historian, National Medal of Honor Museum *Immortal Valor tells the story of seven courageous Americans who deeply loved their country at a time when America did not love them back. When it counted most, these men risked their lives in a manner above and beyond the call of duty, proving that patriotism is not defined by skin color, but by a person’s willingness to put cause and comrades first. Robert Child’s inspiring book conveys a valuable lesson to anyone wishing to understand the full extent of the American character. * Gregory J.W. Urwin Professor of History Temple University *Child is able to mould the emotional and military experiences of each soldier in this novel, allowing the prose to flow easily as we are enraptured in tumultuous and heroic battle scenes. * Aspects of History *Table of ContentsAuthor’s Note List of Illustrations Introduction PART ONE – CHARLES L. THOMAS Chapter 1: Graduation Day Chapter 2: Last Stop USA Chapter 3: A Hell of Fire PART TWO – VERNON J. BAKER Chapter 4: The Boy from Cheyenne Chapter 5: The Italian Front Chapter 6: Storming the Castle PART THREE – WILLY JAMES JR. Chapter 7: A Fifth Platoon Chapter 8: Crossing the Rhine Chapter 9: Into the Lion’s Mouth PART FOUR – EDWARD ALLEN CARTER JR. Chapter 10: Baptism by Fire Chapter 11: A Mercenary Man Chapter 12: March to the Rhine PART FIVE – GEORGE WATSON Chapter 13: Picnic at a Hanging Chapter 14: Off to War Chapter 15: Operation Lilliput PART SIX – RUBEN RIVERS Chapter 16: Black Gold Chapter 17: A New Esprit de Corps Chapter 18: Patton’s Panthers PART SEVEN – JOHN FOX Chapter 19: Transfer Student Chapter 20: Shipping Out Chapter 21: Give ’em Hell Epilogue: The Rest of the Story Afterword: The Long Road to Recognition Acknowledgments Appendix Notes Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisTrade ReviewImmortal Valor tells the story of America’s unsung heroes in a moving and insightful narrative. The research is meticulous and detailed, making each character rise up off the page. * Martin J. Dugard, New York Times bestselling co-author of 'Killing Patton' *The contributions and sacrifices made by African-Americans during World War II were endless, and many times unheralded unless you served alongside and depended on these courageous men in battle. War does not discriminate, but people do. These seven Medal of Honor recipients rose above that prejudice, and this well-written book shares their incredible stories that the public needs to hear. * Tim Gray, Founder and President, The World War II Foundation *This is the only comprehensive narrative written about the African American Medal of Honor recipients of WWII to date. Extremely well written, with very little personal background on some of these men to work with, Child manages to bring each of these heroes’ stories to life on a personal level. Child carefully reconstructs each recipient’s life prior to his act of valor, demonstrating the character traits that made each an example of integrity, sacrifice and courage. This is a must-read book about seven black soldiers and their bravery at the highest level and the racial injustice that took over four decades to acknowledge. Well done! * Arthur Collins, President, 5th Platoon, the black World War II education and reenactment group *In Immortal Valor, Robert Child celebrates the lives of seven men whose valor, personal character, and love of country took them above and beyond the call of duty. We learn not just what they did to earn the Medal of Honor--an honor they were denied for far too long--but who they were as human beings, so that their examples can continue to touch us today. * Edward G. Lengel, Ph.D., Chief Historian, National Medal of Honor Museum *Immortal Valor tells the story of seven courageous Americans who deeply loved their country at a time when America did not love them back. When it counted most, these men risked their lives in a manner above and beyond the call of duty, proving that patriotism is not defined by skin color, but by a person’s willingness to put cause and comrades first. Robert Child’s inspiring book conveys a valuable lesson to anyone wishing to understand the full extent of the American character. * Gregory J.W. Urwin Professor of History Temple University *Child is able to mould the emotional and military experiences of each soldier in this novel, allowing the prose to flow easily as we are enraptured in tumultuous and heroic battle scenes. * Aspects of History *Table of ContentsAuthor’s Note List of Illustrations Introduction PART ONE – CHARLES L. THOMAS Chapter 1: Graduation Day Chapter 2: Last Stop USA Chapter 3: A Hell of Fire PART TWO – VERNON J. BAKER Chapter 4: The Boy from Cheyenne Chapter 5: The Italian Front Chapter 6: Storming the Castle PART THREE – WILLY JAMES JR. Chapter 7: A Fifth Platoon Chapter 8: Crossing the Rhine Chapter 9: Into the Lion’s Mouth PART FOUR – EDWARD ALLEN CARTER JR. Chapter 10: Baptism by Fire Chapter 11: A Mercenary Man Chapter 12: March to the Rhine PART FIVE – GEORGE WATSON Chapter 13: Picnic at a Hanging Chapter 14: Off to War Chapter 15: Operation Lilliput PART SIX – RUBEN RIVERS Chapter 16: Black Gold Chapter 17: A New Esprit de Corps Chapter 18: Patton’s Panthers PART SEVEN – JOHN FOX Chapter 19: Transfer Student Chapter 20: Shipping Out Chapter 21: Give ’em Hell Epilogue: The Rest of the Story Afterword: The Long Road to Recognition Acknowledgments Appendix Notes Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisSettlers is a testament to Jimi Famurewa''s love not just for his lineage, but for the culture. An incisive, intimate and profound work.- Candice Carty-Williams, author of Queenie and People PersonAs thrilling as it is touching and revealing - this book is an indispensable map to London today.- Ben Judah, Journalist and author of This is London: Life and Death in the World CityJimi brings modern black London alive like no other author. This feels like an important book that is also a total pleasure to read. - Sathnam Sanghera, author of Empireland: How Modern Britain is Shaped by its Imperial PastThe past, present and future of being Black, African and British in the capital.This is a story that begins with post-1960s arrivals from Nigeria, Ghana, Zimbabwe and Somalia. Today their descendants have unleashed a tidal wave of British creativity from Lambeth to Lagos, IslingtTrade ReviewAs thrilling as it is touching and revealing - this book is an indispensable map to London today. * Ben Judah, Journalist and author of This is London: Life and Death in the World City *Illuminating and fascinating, with humour and some surprises, Jimi Famurewa examines Britain's African communities, past and present. * Stephen Bourne, author of Black Poppies: Britain's Black Community and the Great War *Jimi brings modern black London alive like no other author. This feels like an important book that is also a total pleasure to read. * Sathnam Sanghera, author of EmpireLand: How Modern Britain is Shaped by its Imperial Past *Settlers is the book I didn’t know I was waiting for. Jimi Famurewa approaches an incredibly complicated topic with a steady hand and fine precision that results in a book that is well researched, rich in nuance and handled with care. It was as enjoyable to read as it was enlightening. * Jendella Benson, author of Hope & Glory *This is an extraordinary and beautifully written piece of work that deals with a deeply complex and rich history with a remarkable lightness of touch, sensitivity, warmth and insight. It is depressing to reflect on the reality that all too many people continue to question the benefits of immigration. This fine book shows beyond any doubt that London, and this country, is all the better for its Black African population. * James Ramsden *A spellbinding portrait of culture, talent, food and activism. * Stylist Magazine *Settlers is replete with revealing anecdotes… Famurewa’s writing is thoughtful, cogent and admirably even-handed. * theguardian.com *Dazzling. * Waitrose Food Magazine *[Jimi's] voice and the way he writes I just love. * Jamie Oliver *Settlers is a pleasure to read, by turns lyrical, approachable, funny, sensitive and always well-researched… [Famurewa] sweeps you along so thoroughly that you don’t realise until you close the book quite how much you have enjoyed it, how much you have learnt and how much it will stay with you. * The Spectator *Combined with [Jimi's] own family history, this is a sometimes painful but always postivie story of defiance and reclamation. * theguardian.com *Table of ContentsPrologue: The Second Great Wave 1 Farm 2 Market 3 Boat 4 Cell 5 Worship House 6 Restaurant 7 Classroom 8 Suburb Conclusion: The Next Great Wave Further Reading Acknowledgements Index

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Book SynopsisA journey into the extraordinary, vibrant world of Black African London which is shaping modern Britain. What makes a Londoner? What is it to be Black, African and British? And how can we understand the many tangled roots of our modern nation without knowing the story of how it came to be?This is a story that begins not with the Windrush Generation' of Caribbean immigrants to Britain, but with post-1960s arrivals from African countries like Nigeria, Ghana, Zimbabwe and Somalia. Some came from former British colonies in the wake of newfound independence; others arrived seeking prosperity and an English education for their children. Now, in the 2020s, their descendants have unleashed a tidal wave of creativity and cultural production stretching from Lambeth to Lagos, Islington to the Ivory Coast. Daniel Kaluuya and Skepta; John Boyega and Little Simz; Edward Enninful and Bukayo Saka everywhere you look, across the fields of sport, business, fashion, the arts and beyTrade ReviewAs thrilling as it is touching and revealing - this book is an indispensable map to London today. -- Ben Judah * Journalist and author of This is London: Life and Death in the World City *Illuminating and fascinating, with humour and some surprises, Jimi Famurewa examines Britain's African communities, past and present. -- Stephen Bourne * author of Black Poppies: Britain's Black Community and the Great War *Jimi brings modern black London alive like no other author. This feels like an important book that is also a total pleasure to read. -- Sathnam Sanghera * author of EmpireLand: How Modern Britain is Shaped by its Imperial Past *Settlers is the book I didn’t know I was waiting for. Jimi Famurewa approaches an incredibly complicated topic with a steady hand and fine precision that results in a book that is well researched, rich in nuance and handled with care. It was as enjoyable to read as it was enlightening. -- Jendella Benson * author of Hope & Glory *This is an extraordinary and beautifully written piece of work that deals with a deeply complex and rich history with a remarkable lightness of touch, sensitivity, warmth and insight. It is depressing to reflect on the reality that all too many people continue to question the benefits of immigration. This fine book shows beyond any doubt that London, and this country, is all the better for its Black African population. -- James RamsdenA spellbinding portrait of culture, talent, food and activism. * Stylist Magazine *Settlers is replete with revealing anecdotes… Famurewa’s writing is thoughtful, cogent and admirably even-handed. * theguardian.com *Dazzling. * Waitrose Food Magazine *[Jimi's] voice and the way he writes I just love. * Jamie Oliver *Settlers is a pleasure to read, by turns lyrical, approachable, funny, sensitive and always well-researched… [Famurewa] sweeps you along so thoroughly that you don’t realise until you close the book quite how much you have enjoyed it, how much you have learnt and how much it will stay with you. * The Spectator *Settlers is a testament to Jimi Famurewa's love not just for his lineage, but for the culture. An incisive, intimate and profound work. -- Candice Carty-Williams * author of Queenie and People Person *Table of ContentsPrologue: The Second Great Wave 1 Farm 2 Market 3 Boat 4 Cell 5 Worship House 6 Restaurant 7 Classroom 8 Suburb Conclusion: The Next Great Wave Further Reading Acknowledgements Index

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Book SynopsisWriting Black Scotland examines race and racism in devolutionary Scottish literature, with a focus on the critical significance of blackness.

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Book SynopsisHow century-long arguments about The Birth of a Nation have profoundly shaped ideas about film, race, and art.Trade ReviewCinema’s Original Sin is a fascinating, authoritative, and essential text for anyone interested in film history, the history of racism and its on-going echoes, or examining the history of ongoing social conversations from the public, press, and academia...The Birth of a Nation is not a masterpiece. It’s well-executed propaganda. It’s time to call that out and acknowledge it, which Professor McEwan definitively does with flawless scholarship and inarguable logic. It’s an essential read and an essential contribution to numerous on-going cultural conversations. * Mastering Modernity *Few films in the history of the medium have been as widely discussed as D. W. Griffith’s The Birth of a Nation...Yet it is this very excess of existing commentary that makes Paul McEwan’s contribution in the form of Cinema’s Original Sin so worthwhile and, ultimately, compelling...Tracing a long and contentious reception history that begins before cinema’s widespread acceptance as an art in its own right, McEwan delineates with rare authority how changing ideas about racism, artistic expression and film culture have been intertwined since the very earliest years of feature filmmaking in the United States. * Early Popular Visual Culture *Alongside the history McEwan keeps track of how film criticism might contribute to and ameliorate the contours of white supremacy—film criticism that includes his book and now this little review. * CHOICE *McEwan presents an enchanting and well-researched historical past . . . and argues that this controversy inside movie historical past has formed understandings of movie, race, and artwork. * Hetflix *Cinema’s Original Sin is expansive, particularly for students who think of racism and the cinema solely in terms of representational strategies. Once it becomes clear that the issue is structural, adjusting representational strategies appears an insufficient solution to the issues that led—and in some instances continue to lead—to Griffith’s defense. * Film Quarterly *Table of Contents Acknowledgments Introduction 1. A New Art, 1895–1915 2. Film Art, Intolerance, and Oscar Micheaux, 1915–1925 3. Little Theatres, MOMA, and the Birth of Art Cinema, 1925–1945 4. From American History to Film History, 1945–1960 5. In Search of Legitimacy and Masterpieces: Film Studies in the Academy, 1960–2000 6. Race, Reception, and Remix in the New Millennium Epilogue Notes Index

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Book SynopsisExamines the influence of the Federal Council of Churches' Department of Race RelationsA Theology of Brotherhood explores how the national umbrella Christian organization, the Federal Council of Churches, acted as a crucial conduit and organizational force for the dissemination of progressive views on race in the first half of the twentieth century. Drawing on years of archival research, Curtis J. Evans shows that the Council's theological approach to race, and in particular its anti-lynching campaign, were responsible for meaningful progress in some white Protestant churches on racial issues. The book highlights the contributions that their religious vision made in expanding and propagating a civic nationalist tradition that was grounded in a universal brotherhood and belief in the equality of all human beings, over against a racial nationalist ideology that conceived of America in ethno-racial terms. Evans makes the case that this predominantly white religious organization contriTrade ReviewAn important addition to the field, both for its scholarly significance and its contemporary relevance. This history has never been laid out in such a manner. . . . It’s a book the field has been waiting for, and that it needs. -- Matthew S. Hedstrom, University of VirginiaA unique examination of mainline Protestantism as a significant force in twentieth-century American history, one that should be examined not merely for its decline into irrelevancy but instead for its fundamental contribution to American ideas of diversity, equity, and justice. -- Paul Harvey, author of? Martin Luther King: A Religious Life

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Book SynopsisA fascinating biography of a fascinating woman. - Booklist, starred reviewThis definitive look at a remarkable figure delivers the goods. - Publishers Weekly, starred reviewA brilliant analysis. - Jericho Brown, Pulitzer Prize winnerFeatured in Ms. Magazine's Most Anticipated Reads for the Rest of Us 2022 (books by or about historically excluded groups)Born in New Orleans in 1875 to a mother who was formerly enslaved and a father of questionable identity, Alice Dunbar-Nelson was a pioneering activist, writer, suffragist, and educator. Until now, Dunbar-Nelson has largely been viewed only in relation to her abusive ex-husband, the poet Paul Laurence Dunbar. This is the first book-length look at this major figure in Black women's history, covering her life from the post-reconstruction era through the Harlem Renaissance.Tara T. Green builds on Black feminist, sexuality, historical and cultural studies to create Trade ReviewAnalysis of Dunbar-Nelson’s stories and poems are woven into the main episodes of her life, which helps shape Green’s exquisite examination of Dunbar-Nelson’s public persona. This definitive look at a remarkable figure delivers the goods. * Publishers Weekly (starred review) *‘Respectability politics’ has always been a flashpoint for marginalized groups … Few historical figures understood this better than Alice Dunbar-Nelson, the bisexual, feminist, and Black activist most famous for her marriage to poet Paul Laurence Dunbar but deserving of recognition for her poetry and essays. Green makes it clear that as a Black woman, Dunbar-Nelson struggled with conflicting codes of respectability … [and] chronicles how, throughout her life as clubwoman, teacher, journalist, activist, and wife to the temperamental and abusive Dunbar, Dunbar-Nelson navigated the contradictions of intersectional Black feminism, carefully guarding her image as a ‘respectable’ woman while advocating for radical causes, writing openly about colorism and same-sex relationships, and serving as her husband’s sexual scapegoat and (literal) punching bag. A fascinating biography of a fascinating woman. * Booklist (starred review) *This is the first book-length biography of Alice Dunbar-Nelson, the trailblazing activist, writer, suffragist and educator, remarkably researched and written by University of North Carolina Professor Tara T. Green. * Ms. Magazine *Tara Green proves herself the scholar born to make the sojourn through archives of every kind to bring us Love, Activism, and the Respectable Life of Alice Dunbar-Nelson. This book is superb in its ability to show through the example of a secretly queer and always revolutionary Dunbar-Nelson how Black people continue to subvert the very systems in which we participate for the sake of or survival. Thanks to Professor Green, we can finally see full-fledged that Harlem Renaissance figure whose name too many of us know better than we know her work. This is a brilliant analysis. * Jericho Brown, Charles Howard Candler Professor of English and Creative Writing, Emory University, USA, and author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning collection The Tradition *In this meticulously researched and brilliantly crafted study, Tara T. Green commences to construct a portrait of Alice Dunbar-Nelson that lifts her from the shadows and resituates her in a space where her talents as a writer, organizer, editor, and activist are consistently foregrounded. Green’s investigation of Dunbar-Nelson’s vast archive demonstrates with tremendous persuasiveness that far from being a minor figure in African American literary history and cultural production, Dunbar-Nelson’s work across creative, political, and activist registers anticipates the kind of work that will be taken up by Zora Neale Hurston, Pauli Murray, Audre Lorde, and Alice Walker later in the 20th Century to further the cause of Black feminist organization and to challenge the intersectional barriers to an authentic and fully-realized selfhood. Producing a work that puts Green’s talents as literary detective, feminist theorist, and critical interlocutor in bold relief, what ultimately makes this study so valuable is its insistence that Dunbar-Nelson had an unflinching commitment to a life lived on its own terms, emphasizes how one Black woman’s political agency was contingent on her ability to define whom she could love and how. * Herman Beavers, Professor of English and Africana Studies, University of Pennsylvania, USA *The archival work Tara T. Green has done here is remarkable. We know more about Alice Dunbar-Nelson that we imagined we could know. But there's more. This book teaches us about the layers of Black women's lives that go unremarked upon even when they are remarkable. This book about Alice Dunbar-Nelson's life of activism is itself an act of liberation. * Dana A. Williams, Professor of African American Literature, Howard University, USA *Table of ContentsIntroducing a Respectable Activist 1. A Respectable Activist Is Born 2. The New Negro Woman in Alice’s Literature 3. Activism, Love, and Pain 4. Love and Writing 5. Finding Alice After Paul 6. Love and Education 7. Ms. Dunbar and Politics 8. New Negro Woman’s Activism 9. Family, Film, and the Paper 10. The Respectable Activist’s Harlem Renaissance 11. Love, Desire, and Writing 12. ’til Death Does the Activist Part Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisHow Americans learned to wait on time for racial change What if, Joseph Darda asks, our desire to solve racism—with science, civil rights, antiracist literature, integration, and color blindness—has entrenched it further? In The Strange Career of Racial Liberalism, he traces the rise of liberal antiracism, showing how reformers' faith in time, in the moral arc of the universe, has undercut future movements with the insistence that racism constitutes a time-limited crisis to be solved with time-limited remedies. Most historians attribute the shortcomings of the civil rights era to a conservative backlash or to the fracturing of the liberal establishment in the late 1960s, but the civil rights movement also faced resistance from a liberal "frontlash," from antiredistributive allies who, before it ever took off, constrained what the movement could demand and how it could demand it. Telling the stories of Ruth Benedict, Kenneth Clark, W. E. B. Du Bois, John Howard Griffin, Pauli Murray, Lillian Smith, Richard Wright, and others, Darda reveals how Americans learned to wait on time for racial change and the enduring harm of that trust in the clock. Trade Review"A riveting guide to why the grand movement demand for 'Freedom now!' was so often eclipsed by what Dr. King called the 'tranquilizing drug of gradualism.' As acute in its meditations on the nature of time as it is in its dissection of racial liberalism."—David Roediger, author of The Sinking Middle Class: A Political History"Darda's powerful and elegant book places racial liberalism at the center of a national story about the endurance of racial subordination within a political system predicated on formal rights and equality. Provides essential bearings for our current moment of racial rebellion and reaction."—Daniel Martinez HoSang, Author of A Wider Type of Freedom: How Struggles for Racial Justice Liberate Everyone

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Book SynopsisHow Americans learned to wait on time for racial change What if, Joseph Darda asks, our desire to solve racism—with science, civil rights, antiracist literature, integration, and color blindness—has entrenched it further? In The Strange Career of Racial Liberalism, he traces the rise of liberal antiracism, showing how reformers' faith in time, in the moral arc of the universe, has undercut future movements with the insistence that racism constitutes a time-limited crisis to be solved with time-limited remedies. Most historians attribute the shortcomings of the civil rights era to a conservative backlash or to the fracturing of the liberal establishment in the late 1960s, but the civil rights movement also faced resistance from a liberal "frontlash," from antiredistributive allies who, before it ever took off, constrained what the movement could demand and how it could demand it. Telling the stories of Ruth Benedict, Kenneth Clark, W. E. B. Du Bois, John Howard Griffin, Pauli Murray, Lillian Smith, Richard Wright, and others, Darda reveals how Americans learned to wait on time for racial change and the enduring harm of that trust in the clock. Trade Review"A riveting guide to why the grand movement demand for 'Freedom now!' was so often eclipsed by what Dr. King called the 'tranquilizing drug of gradualism.' As acute in its meditations on the nature of time as it is in its dissection of racial liberalism."—David Roediger, author of The Sinking Middle Class: A Political History"Darda's powerful and elegant book places racial liberalism at the center of a national story about the endurance of racial subordination within a political system predicated on formal rights and equality. Provides essential bearings for our current moment of racial rebellion and reaction."—Daniel Martinez HoSang, Author of A Wider Type of Freedom: How Struggles for Racial Justice Liberate Everyone

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Book SynopsisAt a time when movements for racial justice are front and center in U.S. national politics, this book provides essential new understanding to the study of race, its influence on people's lives, and what we can do to address the persistent and foundational American problem of systemic racism. Knowledge about race and racism changes as social and historical conditions evolve, as different generations of scholars experience unique societal conditions, and as new voices from those who have previously been kept at the margins have challenged us to reconceive our thinking about race and ethnicity. In this collection of essays by prominent sociologists whose work has transformed the understanding of race and ethnicity, each reflects on their career and how their personal experiences have shaped their contribution to understanding racism, both in scholarly and public debate. Merging biography, memoir, and sociohistorical analysis, these essays provide vital insight into the influence of race on people's perspectives and opportunities both inside and outside of academia, and how racial inequality is felt, experienced, and confronted. Trade Review"In this must-read volume,distinguished and trailblazing sociologists reflect on their encounters with sociology and academic institutions. Pushing the boundaries of our understanding of interlocking systems of oppression, these essays reveal the often unspoken and unwritten winding career paths of marginalized faculty and the critical moments in their lives that shaped the contours of their research and their commitments for the future of the discipline. This volume is a necessary intervention, balm and reminder that those of us on the margins are not alone and that our work matters."—Victoria Reyes, Author of Academic Outsider: Stories of Exclusion and Hope"Prepare to be captivated by the gripping and courageous life stories woven within these pages! This groundbreaking anthology brings together a distinguished group of senior sociologists, predominantly scholars of color, who have drawn on their lifetime experiences to redefine and expand the study of racism and sexism in the United States. Engaging, thought-provoking, and richly informative, Moving from the Margins is a must-read for anyone seeking a fresh and dynamic exploration of persisting social justice issues in America and beyond."—Joe Feagin, Distinguished Professor of Sociology, Texas A&M University, and Past-President of the American Sociological Association"This insightful, deeply personal book gives a unique window into how some of the leading sociologists of race draw from their own experiences and backgrounds to develop exceptional, ground breaking scholarship. It's a must-read with a fresh take on how the personal informs the political—and the sociological!"—Adia Wingfield, Washington University in St. Louis, President-elect of the American Sociological Association"It is difficult to overstate the structural and systemic forces of inequality that persist in the United States, let alone the current rise in regressive laws and policies rooted in interlocking systems of white supremacy, capitalism, and patriarchy. And yet, reading this powerful collection of essays penned by eminent, pathbreaking scholars of race and racism, helps to make sense of it all—where we came from, where we are now, and crucially, where we might go. The generosity of these activist-scholars whose shoulders we stand on, and the vulnerability revealed in their personal and intellectual meditations, is a gift to early career scholars who will see themselves reflected in these narratives."—Zulema Valdez, University of California, MercedTable of ContentsLife Histories on Transforming the Study of Racism: An Introduction 1. Doing Sociology While Black 2. The Praxis of Being Black in America: Grounding the Intellectual Project 3. From Clueless to Critical: My Journey to Understanding the Intersections of Race, Class, and Gender 4. Thinking through Race 5. Killing Me Softly: Race, Racism, and Sociology in My Life 6. "I Change Myself; I Change the World": The Testimonio of a First-Generation Chicana Scholar-Activist 7. A Critical Race Feminist at the Crossroads of Biography and History 8. An Affirmative Action Confession 9. The Sandbox, Sisterhood, and a Sociological Journey 10. From El Valle to Public Sociology: My Personal Intellectual Journey 11. Shifting Boundaries 12. Disrupting Silences: Affect and Embodied Experiences of Systemic Oppression 13. Redefining and Reclaiming Race as a Latina Sociologist 14. Always Observant: The Academic Journey of an Urban Ethnographer 15. An Outsider Within: Reflections on the Intersections of My Life and Work

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Book SynopsisAt a time when movements for racial justice are front and center in U.S. national politics, this book provides essential new understanding to the study of race, its influence on people's lives, and what we can do to address the persistent and foundational American problem of systemic racism. Knowledge about race and racism changes as social and historical conditions evolve, as different generations of scholars experience unique societal conditions, and as new voices from those who have previously been kept at the margins have challenged us to reconceive our thinking about race and ethnicity. In this collection of essays by prominent sociologists whose work has transformed the understanding of race and ethnicity, each reflects on their career and how their personal experiences have shaped their contribution to understanding racism, both in scholarly and public debate. Merging biography, memoir, and sociohistorical analysis, these essays provide vital insight into the influence of race on people's perspectives and opportunities both inside and outside of academia, and how racial inequality is felt, experienced, and confronted. Trade Review"In this must-read volume,distinguished and trailblazing sociologists reflect on their encounters with sociology and academic institutions. Pushing the boundaries of our understanding of interlocking systems of oppression, these essays reveal the often unspoken and unwritten winding career paths of marginalized faculty and the critical moments in their lives that shaped the contours of their research and their commitments for the future of the discipline. This volume is a necessary intervention, balm and reminder that those of us on the margins are not alone and that our work matters."—Victoria Reyes, Author of Academic Outsider: Stories of Exclusion and Hope"Prepare to be captivated by the gripping and courageous life stories woven within these pages! This groundbreaking anthology brings together a distinguished group of senior sociologists, predominantly scholars of color, who have drawn on their lifetime experiences to redefine and expand the study of racism and sexism in the United States. Engaging, thought-provoking, and richly informative, Moving from the Margins is a must-read for anyone seeking a fresh and dynamic exploration of persisting social justice issues in America and beyond."—Joe Feagin, Distinguished Professor of Sociology, Texas A&M University, and Past-President of the American Sociological Association"This insightful, deeply personal book gives a unique window into how some of the leading sociologists of race draw from their own experiences and backgrounds to develop exceptional, ground breaking scholarship. It's a must-read with a fresh take on how the personal informs the political—and the sociological!"—Adia Wingfield, Washington University in St. Louis, President-elect of the American Sociological Association"It is difficult to overstate the structural and systemic forces of inequality that persist in the United States, let alone the current rise in regressive laws and policies rooted in interlocking systems of white supremacy, capitalism, and patriarchy. And yet, reading this powerful collection of essays penned by eminent, pathbreaking scholars of race and racism, helps to make sense of it all—where we came from, where we are now, and crucially, where we might go. The generosity of these activist-scholars whose shoulders we stand on, and the vulnerability revealed in their personal and intellectual meditations, is a gift to early career scholars who will see themselves reflected in these narratives."—Zulema Valdez, University of California, MercedTable of ContentsLife Histories on Transforming the Study of Racism: An Introduction 1. Doing Sociology While Black 2. The Praxis of Being Black in America: Grounding the Intellectual Project 3. From Clueless to Critical: My Journey to Understanding the Intersections of Race, Class, and Gender 4. Thinking through Race 5. Killing Me Softly: Race, Racism, and Sociology in My Life 6. "I Change Myself; I Change the World": The Testimonio of a First-Generation Chicana Scholar-Activist 7. A Critical Race Feminist at the Crossroads of Biography and History 8. An Affirmative Action Confession 9. The Sandbox, Sisterhood, and a Sociological Journey 10. From El Valle to Public Sociology: My Personal Intellectual Journey 11. Shifting Boundaries 12. Disrupting Silences: Affect and Embodied Experiences of Systemic Oppression 13. Redefining and Reclaiming Race as a Latina Sociologist 14. Always Observant: The Academic Journey of an Urban Ethnographer 15. An Outsider Within: Reflections on the Intersections of My Life and Work

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Book SynopsisDiscover how—and why—Black, Indigenous, and people of color in America experience societal, economic, and infrastructural inequality throughout history covering everything from Columbus’s arrival in 1492 to the War on Drugs to the Black Lives Matter movement.From reparations to the prison industrial complex and redlining, there are a lot of high-level concepts to systemic racism that are hard to digest. At a time where everyone is inundated with information on structural racism, it can be hard to know where to start or how to visualize the disenfranchisement of BIPOC Americans. In Systemic Racism 101, you will find infographic spreads alongside explanatory text to help you visualize and truly understand societal, economic, and structural racism—along with what we can do to change it. Starting from the discovery of America in 1492, through the Civil Rights movement, all the way to the criminal justice reform today, this book has everything you need to know about the continued fight for equality.

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Book SynopsisThe concept of Afropessimism does not refer to Black people, but rather to the likelihood of white society overcoming its own negrophobia, and to a radical distrust in white narratives of inclusivity. What if the ideas and reforms we regard as progressive were just the new and shiny face of racism? In the time of Black Lives Matter, the unswerving dehumanization and killing of Black people form the bedrock of our civilization. But a vast anti-Black collective feeling also manifests itself as a more insidious shared unconscious, hidden from view by the doctrines we deem as emancipatory. This book challenges the simplistic and pacifying aspects of current African American thought. It puts forward alternatives to intersectionality, poststructuralism, and radical democracy, which are often prioritized in the Black analysis of race, gender, and class. Accessible, historically informed, and politically alert, this book offers a critical analysis of the groundbreaking theories and strategies that radically reimagine the future of Black lives throughout the world.Trade Review“Norman Ajari’s Darkening Blackness is a masterful defense of Afro-American pessimism and Black Male Studies against the misguided view that ‘pessimism’ means hopelessness and eternal defeat. Instead, pessimism is treated as meaning the rejection of fantasies, especially the fantasy that says one more revision will alter insidious white racialized civil society and intrinsically unjust Euro/American institutions. Step into Ajari’s theoretical world and step out unburdened by fantasy.”Leonard Harris, Purdue University“For those who still do not understand that the pessimism in Afropessimism is not an emotional dispensation but a meta-critique of the first principles of Western thought, Norman Ajari’s Darkening Blackness is required reading. His analysis of Black Male Studies will have as many people nodding their heads as shaking their heads, which is the first step toward rigorous and honest debate.”Frank B. Wilderson III, Chancellor’s Professor of African American Studies, University of California, IrvineTable of ContentsIntroductionChapter 1 The Sources of the Afropessimist ParadigmChapter 2 Theoretical Origins of AfropessimismChapter 3 From the Black Man as Problem to the Study of Black MenChapter 4 A Politics of AntagonismsPostface By Tommy CurryNotesIndex

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Book SynopsisThe concept of Afropessimism does not refer to Black people, but rather to the likelihood of white society overcoming its own negrophobia, and to a radical distrust in white narratives of inclusivity. What if the ideas and reforms we regard as progressive were just the new and shiny face of racism? In the time of Black Lives Matter, the unswerving dehumanization and killing of Black people form the bedrock of our civilization. But a vast anti-Black collective feeling also manifests itself as a more insidious shared unconscious, hidden from view by the doctrines we deem as emancipatory. This book challenges the simplistic and pacifying aspects of current African American thought. It puts forward alternatives to intersectionality, poststructuralism, and radical democracy, which are often prioritized in the Black analysis of race, gender, and class. Accessible, historically informed, and politically alert, this book offers a critical analysis of the groundbreaking theories and strategies that radically reimagine the future of Black lives throughout the world.Trade Review“Norman Ajari’s Darkening Blackness is a masterful defense of Afro-American pessimism and Black Male Studies against the misguided view that ‘pessimism’ means hopelessness and eternal defeat. Instead, pessimism is treated as meaning the rejection of fantasies, especially the fantasy that says one more revision will alter insidious white racialized civil society and intrinsically unjust Euro/American institutions. Step into Ajari’s theoretical world and step out unburdened by fantasy.”Leonard Harris, Purdue University“For those who still do not understand that the pessimism in Afropessimism is not an emotional dispensation but a meta-critique of the first principles of Western thought, Norman Ajari’s Darkening Blackness is required reading. His analysis of Black Male Studies will have as many people nodding their heads as shaking their heads, which is the first step toward rigorous and honest debate.”Frank B. Wilderson III, Chancellor’s Professor of African American Studies, University of California, IrvineTable of ContentsIntroduction Chapter 1 The Sources of the Afropessimist Paradigm Chapter 2 Theoretical Origins of Afropessimism Chapter 3 From the Black Man as Problem to the Study of Black Men Chapter 4 A Politics of Antagonisms Postface By Tommy Curry Notes Index

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Book SynopsisThe global triumph of democracy was announced thirty years ago, promising an age of consensus in which the dispassionate consideration of objective problems would give birth to a world at peace. Today, these grand hopes lie in ruins, and the era touted as new has turned out to be remarkably similar to the old order. To understand why this might be so, we need to examine the nature of the consensus itself, which is not the peace that it promised but rather the map of a territory on which new forms of warfare are being waged. The objective reality that imposed itself at the end of the 1990s was an absolutized and globalized capitalism which has produced ever more inequality, exclusion and hate. In this book Jacques Rancière delivers a frank and piercing critique of the globalized capitalist consensus. The invasion of Iraq, the riots on Capitol Hill and the rise of the European far right all attest to the true nature of this consensus, as does the current state-sanctioned racism which exploits the disenchanted progressive tradition and is led by an intelligentsia that claims to be left-wing. At the same time, Rancière praises the dynamism of social movements which affirm the power of the assembly of equals and its capacity for worldmaking: autonomous protest collectives have proven themselves capable of opening breaches in the consensual order and challenging the post-1989 system of domination.Trade Review‘One of our most original radical philosophers explores why the post-Cold War consensus anticipating global liberal democracy unfolded its opposite. Critically interrogating idioms of populism, secularism, class struggle, democracy, and more, this timely and brilliant collection tracks the domination in consensus itself, placing all bets for an emancipatory, egalitarian future on uprisings that break it.’Wendy Brown, Institute for Advanced Study, PrincetonTable of ContentsPreface Part One. The violence of consensus Chapter One. The new racism: a passion from above Chapter Two. A modest proposal to help the victims Chapter Three. An elusive populism Chapter Four. Unravelling the confusions serving the dominant order Chapter Five. On freedom of expression Chapter Six. The Hatred of Equality Chapter Seven. Fools and sages. Reflections on the end of the Trump presidency Chapter Eight. A golden opportunity? Reflections in the time of lockdown Part Two. Moments of democracy Chapter Nine. The pandemic and inequality Chapter Ten. Interpreting the event 68: politics, philosophy, sociology Chapter Eleven. Occupation Chapter Twelve. Nuit Debout: Desire for Community or Egalitarian Invention? Chapter Thirteen. The virtues of the inexplicable. On the Gilets Jaunes Chapter Fourteen. Beyond the hatred of democracy Chapter Fifteen. Speech at the assembly of railway workers Notes

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Book Synopsis**Winner of the 2022 Sunday Times Charlotte Aitken Young Writer of the Year Award** **A Sunday Times Paperback of the Year** **Longlisted for the CWA Gold Dagger 2023** **Longlisted for the Gordon Burn Prize 2022** ‘Oxblood shows us that there are few places literature can’t take us, if the writer is brave enough, and gifted enough’ FRANCIS SPUFFORD 'The master of northern noir' SUNDAY TIMES 'Brilliant' DENISE MINA 'An absolute triumph' GUARDIAN 'Powerful and so beautifully written' HARRIET TYCE, Sunday Times-bestselling author of BLOOD ORANGE ________________________________________________________________ Wythenshawe, South Manchester. 1985. The Dodds family once ruled Manchester’s underworld; now the men are dead, leaving three generations of women trapped in a house haunted by violence, harbouring an unregistered baby and the ghost of a murdered lover. Over the course of a few days, Nedra, Carol and Jan must each confront the true legacy of the men who have defined their lives; and seize the opportunity to break the cycle for good. _______________________________________________________________ ‘If I read a better novel than Oxblood in 2022, it’ll be a blinding year for fiction’ JOSEPH KNOX 'A propulsive, bountiful, fearless work of art' OYINKAN BRAITHWAITE 'One of the most powerful and urgent writers of our times' DAVID PEACETrade ReviewWith a brutal yet compassionate honesty, Oxblood confronts the past as it was and how it shapes who we are now, and confirms Tom Benn as one of the most powerful and urgent writers of our times -- DAVID PEACE, author of THE RED RIDING QUARTETDeeply immersive and evocative ... a novel to lose yourself in * SUNDAY TIMES, 100 best books for summer 2023 *The master of northern noir * SUNDAY TIMES *A rich archive of bygone badness * THE TIMES *An astonishing piece of work. Captures the stories of three women from an underworld family with ferocious honesty and compassion. Audacious writing - visceral, rich and intense. Unforgettable characters haunted by violence and grief. Exceptional -- CATH STAINCLIFFEOxblood shows us that there are few places literature can’t take us, if the writer is brave enough, and gifted enough -- FRANCIS SPUFFORDI really felt I needed to savour each sentence ... An utterly unique voice, telling a working-class story that resists the usual cliches -- OTEGHA UWAGBAPowerful stuff and so beautifully written - like David Peace wrote Alan Warner’s The Sopranos and so lyrical, too. You don’t care where it’s heading, you’re just happy to step into the flow and let it take you. Brilliant stuff - this is really very good indeed -- HARRIET TYCETom Benn is one of publishing’s best kept secrets. His story about the struggles of three generations of women in a Manchester crime clan has been rendered with such care and specificity that it feels wholly original. The result is a rich, dark, atmospheric family saga that contains so much buried love and anger and grief and sexual jealousy and bitter disappointment … I emerged from it exhilarated -- JOHANNA THOMAS-CORRIf I read a better novel than Oxblood in 2022, it’ll be a blinding year for fiction. Tom Benn, please take a bow. Everybody else, please take note -- JOSEPH KNOXReading Oxblood is a compelling and deeply unsettling experience; this is a novel that glitters with the dark energy and lifeblood of its characters -- NAOMI BOOTHA propulsive, bountiful, fearless work of art -- OYINKAN BRAITHWAITEWhat a voice Tom Benn has got, what a feel for character and place, and what an uncompromising approach he has to his subject and material. He’s gritty but totally empathetic, and inhabits his milieu of 1980s Manchester with total conviction and no attempt to soften the voices of his characters -- ANDREW HOLGATEA remarkable galvanization of a time and a place, its style and substance so rooted in one another it is impossible to imagine it being written by anyone else. A story that seeps into you, sentences turned to catch the light like night eyes. A living thing -- DOMINIC NOLAN, author of Vine StreetOne of those rare books where place and time are conjured so effortlessly, the cast of characters drawn with so much ease and grace -- MONA ARSHIMore than anything, I was enamored with Benn's audacity: to tell this raw, violent, compassionate story; to use language in such a thrilling and fresh way; to explore the dark hearts of ordinary people, and to not look way when things get messy; to be, basically, this good -- D W WILSONThe gangland novel you have never read before, the one that gets inside the minds of three generations of women whose lives are bound to the crime lords of Wythenshawe by blood, flesh, fear, desire and a hunger for possession that cannot be contained in one lifetime. In a place where Mean Streets meets Most Haunted, with his hyper-intense, hallucinogenic prose, Benn will make you believe in ghosts -- CATHI UNSWORTHOxblood is a book to get lost headlong in. Tom Benn manages to be heart-felt and attentive and generous, without ever resorting to being sentimental … This is a book of anti-sentimental greatness, wonderfully written, deft and pungent and sensuous … It is honest and truthful, but also a great feat of fiction -- STIG ABELL

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Book SynopsisAn Amazon Best Non-Fiction Book of 2022'Essential reading' - The Guardian'Sharp and witty with moments of startling candour' - The i'Makes a powerful case' - Rt Hon Lady Hale‘Revealing and beautifully written’ - David Harewood________Before Jeffrey Boakye was a black teacher, he was a black student. Which means he has spent a lifetime navigating places of learning that are white by default. Since training to teach, he has often been the only black teacher at school. At times seen as a role model, at others a source of curiosity, Boakye’s is a journey of exploration – from the outside looking in.In the groundbreaking I Heard What You Said, he recounts how it feels to be on the margins of the British education system. As a black, male teacher – an English teacher who has had to teach problematic texts – his very existence is a provocation to the status quo, giving him a unique perspective on the UK’s classrooms.Through a series of eye-opening encounters based on the often challenging and sometimes outrageous things people have said to him or about him, Boakye reflects on what he has found out about the habits, presumptions, silences and distortions that black students and teachers experience, and which underpin British education.Thought-provoking, witty and completely unafraid, I Heard What You Said is a timely exploration of how we can dismantle racism in the classroom and do better by all our students.________'Hugely important' - Baroness Lawrence'Deeply compelling, intellectually rigorous and essential' - Nels Abbey'Personal and political, profound and playful' - Darren Chetty'Written with passion, fury, knowledge and, in spite of the painful subject, wit' - Patrice LawrenceTrade ReviewEssential reading for teachers, those who run educational institutions, parents – but perhaps most of all for Black children . . . it could be a ray of hope. * The Guardian *Makes a powerful case: until we have rid our educational system of its dominant whiteness we cannot hope to give all our children the educational experience they need and deserve. * Rt Hon Lady Hale *Brave, brutally honest, funny and necessary. Jeffery captures the Black teaching experience in such a powerful and potent way. The book of the year. * Ben Lindsay, author of We Need To Talk About Race *Written with passion, fury, knowledge and, in spite of the painful subject, wit. * Patrice Lawrence MBE, prize-winning author of Orangeboy *Deeply compelling, intellectually rigorous and essential. * Nels Abbey, author of Think Like a White Man *Personal and political, profound and playful, Boakye's sharp analysis of the classroom and the staffroom is essential reading for anyone with a stake in education. * Darren Chetty, co-author of How to Disagree *I couldn't put it down . . . a must read. * Laura Henry-Allain MBE *An incredibly powerful, gripping book . . . energising, uplifting and optimistic and eye-opening and challenging. * Tom Sherrington (@teacherhead) *I found myself being educated, delighted, saddened, informed, surprised, shocked, touched and enlightened in turn . . . A must-read book. * Sue Cowley, author, presenter and teacher *A signature blend of endearing wit and engaging prose. * K. DeMi Ryans *Timely and thought provoking. * Leninna Ofori (@healingoverhandbags) *

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Book SynopsisShortlisted for the Bread & Roses AwardAn Amazon Best Non-Fiction Book of The Year‘Essential reading‘ – The Guardian‘Sharp and witty with moments of startling candour‘ – The i‘Revealing and beautifully written‘ – David Harewood_____A thought-provoking and fearless exploration of how we can dismantle racism in the classroom and do better by all our students.???????Before Jeffrey Boakye was a black teacher, he was a black student. Which means he has spent a lifetime navigating places of learning that are white by default. Since training to teach, he has often been the only black teacher at school. At times seen as a role model, at others a source of curiosity, Boakye’s is a journey of exploration – from the outside looking in.In the groundbreaking I Heard What You Said, he recounts how it feels to be on the margins of the British education system. As a black, male teacher – an English teacher who has had to teach problematic texts – his very existence is a provocation to the status quo, giving him a unique perspective on the UK’s classrooms.Told through a series of eye-opening encounters based on the often challenging and sometimes outrageous things people have said to him or about him – from ‘Can you rap?‘ and ‘Have you been in prison?‘ to ‘Stephen who?‘ – Boakye reflects with passion and wit on what he has found out about the presumptions, silences and distortions that underpin the experience of black students and teachers._____‘Hugely important‘ – Baroness Lawrence‘Deeply compelling, intellectually rigorous and essential‘ – Nels Abbey‘Makes a powerful case‘ – Rt Hon Lady HaleTrade ReviewEssential reading . . . perhaps most of all for those Black children who may be currently going through school not realising why they are made to feel small, out of step and unworthy. For them in particular, it could be a ray of hope. * The Guardian *I Heard What You Said makes a powerful case: until we have rid our educational system of its dominant whiteness we cannot hope to give all our children the educational experience they need and deserve. -- Rt Hon Lady HaleRevealing and beautifully written. -- David HarewoodWritten with passion, fury, knowledge and, in spite of the painful subject, wit. Do you want to break down entrenched structural racism in schools? Then read this. -- Patrice Lawrence MBE, prize-winning author of OrangeboySharp and witty with moments of startling candour. * The i *Deeply compelling, intellectually rigorous and essential . . . The more people read this book, the better our education system will be understood. -- Nels Abbey, author of Think Like a White ManA riveting account . . . Rich with entertaining anecdotes. * The Bookseller *Personal and political, profound and playful, Boakye's sharp analysis of the classroom and the staffroom is essential reading. -- Darren Chetty, co-author of How to DisagreeThe book I’ve been waiting for and the book every teacher should read. Brave, brutally honest, funny and necessary. -- Ben Lindsay, author of We Need To Talk About RaceI couldn't put it down . . . a must read. -- Laura Henry-Allain MBEAn incredibly powerful, gripping book . . . It's simultaneously energising, uplifting and optimistic and eye-opening and challenging. -- Tom Sherrington (@teacherhead)I found myself being educated, delighted, saddened, informed, surprised, shocked, touched and enlightened in turn . . . A must-read book. -- Sue Cowley, author, presenter, teacherA signature blend of endearing wit and engaging prose. -- K. DeMi RyansTimely and thought provoking. -- Leninna Ofori (@healingoverhandbags)An impassioned, articulate, and irresistible call to arms. * SchoolsWeek *

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Book Synopsis'An invaluable collection' BBC'A seminal body of work that centres our voices authentically and unapologetically'Melissa Cummings-Quarry, co-author of Grown and co-founder of Black Girls Book ClubThe Colour of Madness is a groundbreaking anthology amplifying the voices of People of Colour and their experiences with mental health. In this compelling collection, edited by Dr Rianna Walcott and Dr Samara Linton, over seventy contributors share their stories, essays, poetry, short fiction and artwork. Showcasing the voices of those who have been ignored, this book brings solace to those who have shared similar experiences, and sheds light into the everyday impact of racism for those looking to further understand and combat this injustice.A vital and timely tribute to all those whose lives have been impacted by medical inequalities, this collection seeks to disrupt the whitewashed narrative of mental health in Britain and will help to positively transform the mental health and wellbeing of People of Colour.The book was first published in 2018. Editors Dr Samara Linton and Dr Rianna Walcott ended their relationship with their previous publisher in 2021 when the press was linked to a far-right group. The editors have since collaborated with a new publisher to present this refined edition complete with revised contributions, new contributors and powerful artwork.Trade ReviewInvaluable -- BBCThe Colour of Madness leaves my heart simultaneously aching at what Black and Brown people are forced to survive under, and full because I lost count of how many times I saw myself on these pages. -- Paula Akpan, journalist and authorThe Colour of Madness is a seminal body of work that centres our voices authentically and unapologetically. -- Melissa Cummings-Quarry, co-founder of Black Girls Book Club Full of beauty, pain, hope, sadness, humour, and a profound sense of power, this essential text captures the experience of mental health challenges for people of colour in their own words, through a simply stunning collection of poetry, story, and art. -- Dr Peter Olusoga, Chartered Psychologist and host of EightyPercentMental PodcastThis book, which shares the poignant lived voices of the racialised experience, is a welcome contribution to the mission to heal and positively transform our mental health, physical health and well-being. -- Dr Jacqui Dyer, health and social care consultant, Black Thrive Global DirectorThe Colour of Madness is one of those texts you can't read without a pencil to mark beautiful/relatable/heartbreaking quotes. Heading home to find my pencil. -- Serena Arthur, founder of the award-winning Onyx magazineI teach a BA module on Literature and Psychology and have been looking for a book like this for years! -- Samantha Walton, Lecturer: Bath Spa UniversityDeeply personal and sensitive...This book should be read by all trainees and seniors. Although it might make the reader feel uncomfortable, it will help them to build inclusive therapeutic relationships with patients from all ethnic backgrounds and improve the practical accessibility of mental healthcare. -- Anna Sri, head of GeopsychiatryThis collection is a painfully moving chronicle of structural harm; it is also a tender light in the darkness, guiding us towards collective healing -- Leah Cowan, author of Border NationA compassionate and hopeful book, encouraging us to be truly present and engage with the world around us beyond our biases. -- Pragya Agarwal, author of Sway: Unravelling Unconscious BiasThis beautiful curation will be a catalyst to our healing and emancipation. -- Seyi Akiwowo, author of How to Stay Safe Online: A digital self-care toolkit for developing resilience and allyship

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Book SynopsisA ground-breaking argument about children, racism and how to build the antiracist society of the future - from the author of the million-copy global bestseller How To Be an Antiracist*A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER*'One of the pre-eminent intellectuals on race' OWEN JONESHow do kids think about race? How are they affected by it? At what age should we talk to them about racism? What is the best way to do that? How can we raise our children to be antiracist?In this inspiring and deeply personal investigation, Ibram X. Kendi explains how to safeguard our children from racism and how we can all participate in fostering a new generation of antiracists.His essential and revolutionary insight is that our instinct to protect our children from racism by not talking about it is entirely wrong. Using the science of childhood development, illustrated with his own experiences as a father, he shows that only by teaching our children about the realities of racism from the youngest age can we truly protect them and build the antiracist society of the future.---Praise for How To Be an Antiracist (over 1 million copies sold worldwide by August 2020):'One of the US's most respected scholars of race and history' Afua Hirsch, Guardian'Transformative and revolutionary' Robin DiAngelo, author of White Fragility'The most courageous book to date on the problem of race' The New York TimesTrade ReviewOne of the US's most respected scholars of race and history -- Afua HirschOur most trusted voice on antiracism reveals the critical role of parents, caregivers, and teachers in fostering either racist or antiracist attitudes in all children. Rendered intimate with stories from his own childhood and his parenting journey, Ibram X. Kendi once again lights the way. This book is as compassionate as it is cogent and timely -- Julie Lythcott-Haims, New York Times bestselling author of How to Raise an AdultCould hardly be more relevant ... it feels like a light switch being flicked on -- Owen Jones on How To Be an AntiracistTransformative and revolutionary -- Robin DiAngelo, author of White Fragility, on How To Be an AntiracistCombines Kendi's personal experience as a parent with his scholarly expertise in showing how racism affects every step of a child's life ... Like all his books, this one is accessible to everyone regardless of race or class. Read it." * LA Times, “10 books to add to your reading list in June” *The most courageous book to date on the problem of race in the Western mind * The New York Times on How To Be an Antiracist *A must-read -- June Sarpong, author of Diversify, on How To Be an AntiracistSo vital -- Ijeoma Oluo, author of So You Want to Talk About Race, on How To Be an AntiracistKendi lays out an antiracism plan for caregivers in this knockout combination of memoir and parenting guide... Kendi succeeds marvelously in connecting the personal to the systemic, showing how structural inequalities have personal costs-"Who knows how much potential racism has buried?" This will be an invaluable resource for any parent or teacher who want to set kids on the path to antiracism early * Publishers Weekly (starred review) *The National Book Award-winning author uses his own life to illustrate the need for anti-racist policy and practices in American schools and homes...The author's vulnerability about his own parenting mistakes and schooling mishaps clarify racist structures with empathy, clarity, and hope for change... an excellent introduction to how racism impacts children across the life span. A useful anti-racist memoir about how anti-racism can make the world safer for all children * Kirkus *Both memoir and call to action, Kendi's insightful book rightly encourages the critical thinking all adults need to engage the children they love in the most essential conversations about racism. Don't fool yourself, silence is not a helpful strategy! If you want to raise empowered, antiracist children, read this book, take a deep breath, and start talking! -- Beverly Daniel Tatum, Ph.D., author of Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria? and Other Conversations About RaceThe littlest human being can learn to be an antiracist. Antiracist parenting is imperative, as white supremacists are recruiting on the internet daily; parents need to be proactive by developing the skills and language to understand the parenting journey of antiracism. With love and vulnerability, and the remarkable brilliance we have now come to expect in his books, Kendi walks us through this journey. No matter where you are as an antiracist parent or the age of your child, this book is for you -- Bettina Love, author of We Want to do More Than Survive: Abolitionist Teaching and the Pursuit of Educational Freedom

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Book Synopsis‘On-road’ is a complex term used by young people to describe street-based subculture and a general way of being. Featuring the voices of young people, this collection explores how race, class and gender dynamics shape this aspect of youth culture. With young people on-road often becoming criminalised due to interlocking structural inequalities, this book looks beyond concerns about gangs and presents empirical research from scholars and activists who work with and study the social lives of young people. It addresses the concerns of practitioners, policy makers and scholars by analysing aspects and misinterpretations of the shifting realities of young people’s urban life.Table of ContentsForeword by Claudia Bernard 1. Introduction: Youth and On-Road – Making Gender and Race Matter - Jade Levell, Tara Young and Rod Earle 2. Black, British Young Women On-Road: Intersections of Gender, Race and Youth in British Interwar Youth Penal Reform - Esmorie Miller 3. Tainted Love: Intimate Relationships and Gendered Violence On-Road - Yusef Bakkali and Ezimma Chigbo 4. (The) Trouble with Friends: Narrative Stories of Friendship and Violence On-Road - Tara Young 5. The Sexual Politics of Masculinity and Vulnerability On-Road: Gender, Race and Male Victimisation - Jade Levell 6. The Road, in Court: How UK Drill Music Became a Criminal Offence - Lambros Fatsis 7. On-Road Inside: Music as a Site of Carceral Convergence - Chris Waller 8. Jeta e Rrugës: Translocal On-Road Hustle, Within and from Albania - Jade Levell and Stephanie Schwandner-Sievers 9. ‘He’s shown me the road’: Role Model and Roadman - Peter Harris 10. Diary of an On-Road Criminologist: An Auto-Ethnographic Reflection - Martin Glynn 11. Conclusions, Compromises and Continuing Conversations - Jade Levell, Tara Young and Rod Earle

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Book SynopsisYou can't avoid it, because it's everywhere. In the looks my kids get in certain spaces, the manner in which some people speak to them, the stuff that goes over their heads. Stuff that makes them cry even when they don't know why. How do you bring up your kids to be kind and happy when there is so much out there trying to break them down?Bringing Up Race is an important book, for all families whatever their race or ethnicity. Racism cuts across all sectors of society - even the Queen will have to grapple with these issues, as great grandmother to a child of mixed ethnicity. It's for everyone who wants to instil a sense of open-minded inclusivity in their kids, and those who want to discuss difference instead of shying away from tough questions. Uju draws on often shocking personal stories of prejudice along with opinions of experts, influencers and fellow parents to give prescriptive advice making this an invaluable guide. Bringing Up Race explores:- When children start noticing ethnic differences (hint: much earlier than you think)- What to do if your child says something racist (try not to freak out) - How to have open, honest, age-appropriate conversations about race- How children and parents can handle racial bullying - How to recognise and challenge everyday racism, aka microaggressionsA call to arms for ALL parents, Bringing Up Race starts the conversation which will mean the next generation have zero tolerance to racial prejudice, and grow up understanding what kindness and happiness truly mean.'Uju Asika has written a necessary book for our times. She throws up huge questions (and responds to them intelligently and with heart). This isn't just a book for talking to children - whatever race or colour they are - about racism and all the other intersecting isms that divide us, it is a book for everyone dedicated to creating a better, kinder world. This crucial book should be required reading!' - Chika Unigwe, author of On Black Sisters' Street, winner of the Nigeria Prize for Literature in 2012, the Bonderman professor for Creative Writing at Brown University and judge of the Man Booker International Prize in 2017.'This book could not be more timely. With so many scrabbling around for resources to help navigate our racialized times, Asika draws upon her own experience as a Black Nigerian mother of two boys to offer parents, teachers, carers, educators these stories for survival. As Asika notes, race can no longer be ignored - her own journey is instructive for all - from running the popular 'Babes About Town' (blogging on the immersive cultural education available for her kids in London and beyond) to now deliberately and necessarily making the explicit connections to raising happy Black boys in a prejudiced world. Written with engaging wit, candour, and verve, and containing heart-breaking and heart-warming anecdotes, Bringing Up Race is a needed call to action for all concerned with a future free from racial prejudice.'- Sai Murray, writer/poet/graphic artist, creative director at Liquorice Fish and trustee of The Racial Justice NetworkTrade ReviewFrom the moment I picked up Bringing Up Race, I couldn't put it down. Honest, funny, practical and thought-provoking, and packed with real-life examples, Uju Asika's work points the way to creating a more just and more kind world. -- Gretchen Rubin

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Book Synopsis'Samuel Kasumu has written an important - and very moving - book about the outsider phenomenon.' - Robert Peston' I loved reading about your childhood and your anxieties as a father. The personal is so well mixed with the analytical. Thank you for reflecting our experiences and ideas so well and so sensitively. This is really great to read!' - Kadie Kanneh-MasonSamuel Kasumu was the most senior black advisor in Boris Johnson's government, until he left in April 2021. Throughout his time in Whitehall, Samuel became increasingly aware that he was an outsider - that his own experiences, assumptions and language were so different to many of those he found himself surrounded by in Downing Street.In this book Samuel considers who outsiders are, why they are not talked about enough and how it can be a source of strength that leads them to become high achievers. He argues that the success of many great people can be explained by their outsider status.Drawing on his own experiences in government, growing up and beyond, as well as the stories of other outsiders, famous and lesser known, Samuel shows how outsiders are more likely to be trailblazers and break barriers, how they have a greater sense of perspective and progress and how our differences can be a force for good - in politics and beyond.Trade ReviewWe spend our lives complaining about how insiders have stitched up everything to their advantage. But the biggest winners are often outsiders - who see things others miss and often have superhuman drive. Samuel Kasumu has written an important - and very moving - book about the outsider phenomenon. * Robert Peston *(A) fascinating account of how outsiders can become insiders - a surprisingly moving and personal account of Samuel Kasumu's time as a former race advisor in a Boris Johnson government * Serena Barker-Singh *

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Book SynopsisA memoir told through a series of intimate portraits, which build into a poignant, insightful and unforgettable testimony of West Indian British experience.***A NEW STATESMAN BOOK OF THE YEAR 2023***'Grant is a natural storyteller... Compelling and charming'BERNARDINE EVARISTO, author of Girl, Woman, Other'Grant's most revealing work'NEW STATESMAN‘I’m black, so you don’t have to be,’ Colin Grant’s uncle Castus used to tell him. If Colin – born in Britain to Jamaican parents – worked hard and became a doctor, his race would become invisible; he would shake off the burden his parents’ generation had carried. The reality turned out to be very different.This is a memoir told through a series of intimate portraits, including of Grant’s mother Ethlyn, his father Bageye, his sister Selma, and his great uncle Percy. Each character we meet is navigating their own path. Each life informs Grant’s own shifting sense of his identity. Collectively, these stories build into an unforgettable testimony of black British experience.Trade ReviewColin Grant writes about the characters in his family with the mischievous, dramatic flair of a natural storyteller. This is a compelling and charming read. -- Bernardine Evaristo, Booker Prize-winning author Girl, Woman, OtherAn important and timely book for an increasingly diverse and diffuse set of communities, a reminder of those questions of home and belonging, an invitation to parse them. * Guardian *Fascinating, brilliant, subtle, educative book. -- Michael Rosen, author of We're Going on a Bear HuntThis outstanding memoir contains a beautiful tenderness and a courageous realness. Vibrant, poignant and brutally frank, it is rooted in authenticity and wisdom, the details of a world well-observed. Grant's work here is powerful, evocative, empowered and forthright. -- Salena Godden, author of Mrs Death Misses DeathGrant's most revealing work... This compelling and poignant book gives a convincing answer to the first question: that there is more than one way to be black. * New Statesman *

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Book SynopsisInvestigates how Americans have remembered violence and resistance since the Civil War, including Confederate monuments, historical markers, college classrooms, and history books. George Floyd’s murder in the summer of 2020 sparked a national reckoning for the United States that had been 400 years in the making. Millions of Americans took to the streets to protest both the murder and the centuries of systemic racism that already existed among European colonists but transformed with the arrival of the first enslaved African Americans in 1619. The violence needed to enforce that systemic racism for all those years, from the slave driver’s whip to state-sponsored police brutality, attracted the immediate attention of the protesters. The resistance of the protesters echoed generations of African Americans’ resisting the violence and oppression of white supremacy. Their opposition to violence soon spread to other aspects of systemic racism, including a cultural hegemony built on and reinforcing white supremacy. At the heart of this white supremacist culture is the memory of the Civil War era, when in 1861 8 million white Americans revolted against their country to try to safeguard the enslavement of 4 million African Americans. The volume has three interconnected sections that build on one another. The first section, “Violence,” explores systemic racism in the Civil War era and now with essays on slavery, policing, and slave patrols. The second section, titled “Resistance,” shows how African Americans resisted violence for the past two centuries, with essays discussing matters including self-emancipation and African American soldiers. The final section, “Memory,” investigates how Americans have remembered this violence and resistance since the Civil War, including Confederate monuments and historical markers. This volume is intended for nonhistorians interested in showing the intertwined and longstanding connections between systemic racism, violence, resistance, and the memory of the Civil War era in the United States that finally exploded in the summer of 2020.

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Book SynopsisInvestigates how Americans have remembered violence and resistance since the Civil War, including Confederate monuments, historical markers, college classrooms, and history books. George Floyd’s murder in the summer of 2020 sparked a national reckoning for the United States that had been 400 years in the making. Millions of Americans took to the streets to protest both the murder and the centuries of systemic racism that already existed among European colonists but transformed with the arrival of the first enslaved African Americans in 1619. The violence needed to enforce that systemic racism for all those years, from the slave driver’s whip to state-sponsored police brutality, attracted the immediate attention of the protesters. The resistance of the protesters echoed generations of African Americans’ resisting the violence and oppression of white supremacy. Their opposition to violence soon spread to other aspects of systemic racism, including a cultural hegemony built on and reinforcing white supremacy. At the heart of this white supremacist culture is the memory of the Civil War era, when in 1861 8 million white Americans revolted against their country to try to safeguard the enslavement of 4 million African Americans. The volume has three interconnected sections that build on one another. The first section, “Violence,” explores systemic racism in the Civil War era and now with essays on slavery, policing, and slave patrols. The second section, titled “Resistance,” shows how African Americans resisted violence for the past two centuries, with essays discussing matters including self-emancipation and African American soldiers. The final section, “Memory,” investigates how Americans have remembered this violence and resistance since the Civil War, including Confederate monuments and historical markers. This volume is intended for nonhistorians interested in showing the intertwined and longstanding connections between systemic racism, violence, resistance, and the memory of the Civil War era in the United States that finally exploded in the summer of 2020.

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Book SynopsisIn Nice White Ladies, race and gender professor Jessie Daniels looks beyond the "Karens" and the pussy hats, to offer an illuminating look at how white women participate in, benefit from, and--crucially--can combat racism.Chapter by chapter, Daniels looks at the most urgent examples of how white womanhood has been weaponized today, and then dives deeper into the history and the false narratives behind these events. She examines specific figures including Amy Cooper and the Central Park birdwatcher, and Linda Fairstein and the Central Park Five, but also looks at larger social shifts and the role white women have had in deepening existing inequalities. Seemingly empowering movements for white women have also harmed people of color, from a feminism that had pushed the voices of Brown and Black women aside, to an entire wellness industry that insulates white women in bubble of their own privilege. White women are often unwilling to examine the fact that their day to day choices, including selecting only the best schools and neighborhoods for their children, results in a hoarding of resources for white families and a return to segregation.In a nation deeply divided by race, Jessie Daniels boldly addresses white women's complicity in discrimination but also in their unique potential to resist and dismantle the white nationalism that threatens us all. The stakes are deeply personal for Daniels, as a white woman seeking to call in fellow white women, with an invitation to think together and act-rather than simply call out and criticize. By excavating her own life for examples of failing, learning, evolving, and changing course, Daniels provides a roadmap for other white women looking to make much needed change. Ultimately, she shows how white women can be more than allies, but trusted accomplices in a shared mission to secure equality for all.

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Book SynopsisOften the most recognized, even brutal, events in American history are assigned a bifurcated public narrative. We divide historical and cultural life into two camps, often segregated by a politicized, racially divided "Color Line." But how do we privately experience the most troubling features of American civilization? Where is the Color Line in the mind, in the body, between bodies, between human beings? Ed Pavlic's Visiting Hours at the Color Line, a 2012 National Poetry Series winner, attempts to complicate this black-and-white, straight-line feature of our collective imagination, and to map its nonlinear, deeply colored timbres and hues. From the daring prose poem to the powerful free verse, Pavlic's lines are musically infused, bearing tones of soul, R&B, and jazz. Meanwhile, joining the influence of James Baldwin with a postmodern consciousness the likes of Samuel Beckett, Pavlic tracks the experiences of American characters through situations both mundane and momentous, and exposes the many textures of this social, historical world as it seeps into the private dimensions of our lives. The resulting poems are intense-at times even violent-ambitious, and psychological, making Visiting Hours at the Color Line a poetic tour de force, by one of the century's most acclaimed American poets.Trade Review"Pavlic turns to canonical images and tropes but adds blues, jazz, jargon, and slang in a distinctly contemporary and vigorous American idiom... The final long piece, part of the series of prose poems called 'Verbatim,' is marvelous. A dialogue, more play than poem, it is playful, reminiscent of Beckett but more explicitly philosophical. By itself it makes this entire intriguing collection worthwhile." --Booklist "If we woke up one morning and there were no words around it would be because Ed Pavlic got them all and made a kaleidoscope of poetry. 'Astonishing' doesn't describe anything, I realize that, but that's what came to mind as I read through." --Washington Independent Review of Books "The abundant second-person addresses of Ed Pavlic's Visiting Hours at the Color Line signal these remarkable poems are in conversation with us: our culture, our history, our ghosts. His is a Hopkins-like sprung rhythm of, not only syntax, but edifying consciousness pulsing in a language of idiomatic lyrics and impressions. Even after enraptured multiple readings, I am incapable of succinctly praising this poet's immense talent and this new book's urgent, beautiful complexities." --Terrance Hayes "Ever since I discovered Ed Pavlic's poetry, I find myself measuring other authors against the steady stream of his voice, and the heart and politics one finds in his short and long lines--the very sound of freedom. There are two or three writers one always looks forward to reading, always, and Ed Pavlic, especially in his new book, Visiting Hours at the Color Line, is one of them." --Hilton Als "The self can seem some sinuous melody until otherness syncopates that self-sung, self-singing song. Ed Pavlic's Visiting Hour at the Color Line opens itself, poem by poem, to those interruptions of mere self that mark the awakening not only to our ethical life, but to our erotic one as well. Improvisation within a theme--be it the domestic or be it the workplace, be it history or be it the intimate now--riddles song with those discontinuities in which poetry's deepest vitality resides. Assumed orders of being dismantle as they become thrilled. Pavlic plays us this tune of falling apart so as to stay together. These poems don't prove, but play within the fundamental suspicion that ethics and erotics are one. It is a tune we need to hear: one that lulls where sleep rightly beckons, and one that wakes as exactly where it is we must be awake." --Dan Beachy-Quick "To fully enjoy the sweet complexity and gravity-defying genre blending in Pavlic's Visiting Hours at the Color Line, one has to first put aside fears of postmodern tricksterism and fake-outs, then come to believe that 'talk' happens without words. Inside his staunch, idiomatic phrasings and syntactic figurations is a heart bursting with sharp observations and a desire to read the nonverbal signs that point to and record our supreme humanity. Such poetry is deeply personal and masterfully arranged." --Major Jackson "The tension in Ed Pavlic's poems is a language-cable wrought to swing you out over unnerving spaces, let you see and hear what they really hold, and bring you back up more alive than you were before." --Adrienne Rich "There's a beauty embodied in this poet's straightforward journey." --Yusef Komunyakaa "Ed Pavlic's poetry balances itself on a tightrope of musical strings strung across a precipice between the irrational and the rational." --Stanley Moss

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Book SynopsisMarena struggles to remember the past: a time before the Zero Tolerance Party murdered her mother and put her father under house arrest. A time before they installed listening devices in every home and outlawed writing. A time when she was free. But it feels like the only thing the new, repressive government wants is to have Marena forget. When the Minister of Education, Helmsley Greengritch, cracks down on Marena's youth training facility, she knows she has to fight back. In the spirit of her revolutionary mother, she forms her own resistance group--the White Rose. With nothing but words and a hunger for freedom, Marena fights for what she knows is right, only to discover the ZT Party's horrifying plans for the country. A thrilling story of resistance and the power of art, The Silenced draws upon the true story of Sophie Scholl and the White Rose group's resistance to the Nazi party.Trade ReviewPraise for The Silenced: Wisconsin Library Association 2008 Outstanding Book 2008-2009 Texas Tayshas Reading List 2008-2009 Bookpage Notable Title Read on Wisconsin! Book Choice "This is far and away the best young adult novel I have read for years ... It has a marvelously vibrant and courageous young heroine, and friends who may betray or help--hard to predict. Best of all it is based on one of the most ultimately tough young women to grace this earth. The White Rose. After reading this book, you will want to read more about her." -- Louise Erdrich "Tautly plotted novel ... ripe for discussion." -- Kirkus Reviews "Gripping suspense combined with satisfyingly capable teen characters make this a good YA read ... a convincing dystopia." -- Booklist "The Silenced is unique ... I would recommend this book to students and libraries for its unique approach and readability, and I believe it could be well used in a literature or social studies class to approach an introduction to Holocaust Education" -- Shoah Education "The gripping plot will engage readers and raise fundamental questions about individual responsibility and the cost of conscience." -- VOYA "The book keeps up a fast pace that will appeal to teen readers. An interesting discussion of freedom and control that can be used as a conversation-starter as readers grapple with the question posed to Marena and the other students: 'Who do you think you are?'" -- Children's Literature "James DeVita's grim and sure-to-be-controversial novel of adolescence in a police state ... excellent, though troubling, novel." -- Bookpage (Notable Title) "Escapism with substance." -- Seattle Times "With plenty of twists and betrayals, the fast-paced plot still gives readers time to reflect: Would they risk their lives for what they believe." -- Stephanie Dunnewind "This surrealistic and grim world, wherein children are recruited to spy on their parents, lobotomized resisters are turned into unquestioning guards, and painting a rose can get you murdered, is hauntingly well developed, serving as the perfect challenge for the irascible and resolute Marena ... Compelling protagonist, terrifyingly realistic (sometimes only slightly exaggerated) setting, and gripping pace." -- The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books "This is a gripping read and young adults will certainly empathize with the characters' conflicts between self-expression and a desire to fit in. They will find the Zero Tolerance credo that the state's first priority must be the safety of its citizens to have a chilling resonance with statements in the news today." -- School Library Journal Praise for Blue: American Booksellers Association Pick of the List Virginia Center for Children's Books Best Bet for the Classroom The Center for Children's Books Best Book of 2001 "A cheerfully diverting fantasy about a boy who demonstrates that you really can become anything you want--if you only believe." -- Booklist

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Book SynopsisFlip the script on how you think about UGLY--what it means, what it is, and how to reclaim it to Uplift, Glorify, and Love Yourself in an uglified world.Blending joyful self-help magic with incisive social analysis and personal narrative, Vanessa Rochelle Lewis empowers readers to heal, connect, and revolt against uglification.Uglification is "ugly" weaponized: a tool, ideology, and type of oppression that designates some bodies as more or less worthy of love, respect, access, and dignity. It defines who''s accepted in what spaces, which identities are marginalized, and how we all move through the world--and is part and parcel of systems like white supremacy, ableism, sizeism, sexism, and queer- and transphobia. Here, Lewis takes on uglification, showing us how reclaiming UGLY is a subversive act that roars an unapologetic "yes!" to joy, healing, and community-building in a world that''s engineered to hold us back.Lewis asks us to go beyond analysis, inviting us to boldly perform UGLY as an act of rebellion, liberation, and radical self-love. Through self-help exercises, reflective meditations, and lesson plans, Lewis moves us closer to a collective liberation that takes back what society tells us is ugly and taboo...and teaches us to deconstruct what we''ve told ourselves is ugly and taboo. In sharing her analysis, personal journey, and activity toolkit, Lewis offers a warm embrace and compassionately guides us toward lives of radical self-acceptance, joyful community-centered healing, and unfiltered self-love.

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Book SynopsisBlack Resilience provides powerful strategies for success and empowerment, answering a critical question for the Black community: where do we go from here?This once-in-a-generation book embodies stories and experiences shared by the author—Braeden Anderson—a former high-major NCAA athlete who overcame childhood abuse, homelessness, and severe racism to become an attorney at the world’s largest law firm and a successful entrepreneur. Black Resilience empowers and equips the reader with the strategy to win against any odds and triumph in the face of life’s greatest challenges. Racism can be as loud and resounding as a gunshot, or as quiet and inconspicuous as being laid off. Whether it’s hidden or apparent, we will not escape it without taking action. We—Black people—have the power to effect positive change in our lives and our communities. Black Resilience shows us how. Readers will get an honest, empowering roadmap to address concerns ranging from asserting your identity, the dichotomy of inclusion, employing empathy, and transcending learned helplessness, to the challenge and triumph of Black parenthood. They’ll learn how to deploy what the author calls our “covert operation of tact,” and they’ll see that everyone—Blacks and whites alike—must build one community. Black Resilience represents a tactful and dynamic ideology that belongs in the hands of every reader who is ready to receive the solution for beating racism…for good.

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