Molefi Kete Asante
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Professor and Chair, Department of Africology and African American Studies at Temple University in Philadelphia. He also serves as the International Organizer for Afrocentricity International and is President of the Molefi Kete Asante Institute for Afrocentric Studies.
Teju Cole
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Nigerian-American writer and Kalamazoo College alum. He is also a photographer and art historian.
G. Gabrielle Starr
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Scholar of English literature whose work reaches into neuroscience and the arts. Starr took office as the 10th president of Pomona College in 2017.
Toni Morrison
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American novelist, essayist, book editor, and college professor.
A Mercy by Toni MorrisonA powerful tragedy distilled into a jewel of a masterpiece by the Nobel Prize winning author of Beloved and, almost like a prelude to that story, set two centuries earlier.
Henry Lewis Gates, Jr.
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American literary critic, teacher, historian, filmmaker and public intellectual who serves as the Alphonse Fletcher University Professor and Director of the Hutchins Center for African and African American Research at Harvard University.
The Henry Louis Gates, Jr. Reader by Henry Louis GatesEducator, writer, critic, intellectual, film-maker-Henry Louis Gates, Jr., has been widely praised as being one of America's most prominent and prolific scholars. A collection of three decades of writings from his many fields of interest and expertise.
The Signifying Monkey by Henry Louis GatesExplores the relationship between the African and African-American vernacular traditions and black literature, elaborating a new critical approach located within this tradition that allows the black voice to speak for itself.
Yvonne Welbon
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American independent film director, producer, and screenwriter based in Chicago.
Rhonda Vonshay Sharpe
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Founder and President of the Women’s Institute for Science, Equity and Race. Sharpe was named a "Black Scholars You Should Know" by TheBestSchools.org and BlackEnterprise.com. She is the co-editor of the Review of Black Political Economy and served as the past President of the National Economic Association. In 2019 she was selected to serve on the Center for American Progress’s National Advisory Council on Eliminating the Black-White Wealth Gap.
Kobi K. K. Kambon
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Educator and psychologist whose theory and research has been particularly influential in areas relating to African Psychology, cultural survival in the face of cultural oppression, and mental health. Kambon retired from his position as Department chair and professor in the Psychology Department at Florida A&M University in 2014 following a successful 30-year career at the institution.
Claude Mason Steele
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African-American social psychologist. Steele was executive vice chancellor and provost at the University of California, Berkeley, and currently is professor of psychology at Stanford University.
Whistling Vivaldi by Claude M. SteeleThrough dramatic personal stories, Claude Steele shares the experiments and studies that show, again and again, that exposing subjects to stereotypes--merely reminding a group of female math majors about to take a math test, for example, that women are considered naturally inferior to men at math--impairs their performance in the area affected by the stereotype.
Bettina L. Love
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Award-winning author and Associate Professor of Educational Theory & Practice at the University of Georgia. Dr. Love is one of the field’s most esteemed educational researchers in the area of Hip Hop education.
We Want to Do More Than Survive by Bettina LoveA path to educational justice for all students - one that encourages teachers, parents, and their communities to adopt the rebellious spirit and bold and creative methods of abolitionists. Educator Bettina Love argues that the U.S educational system is maintained by and profits from the suffering of children of color.
Patricia Hill Collins
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Distinguished University Professor of Sociology, specializing in race, class and gender, at the University of Maryland, College Park.
From Black Power to Hip Hop by Patricia Hill CollinsUsing the experiences of African American women and men as a touchstone for analysis, Patricia Hill Collins examines new forms of racism as well as political responses to it.In this incisive and stimulating book, renowned social theorist Patricia Hill Collins investigates how nationalism has operated and re-emerged in the wake of contemporary globalization and offers an interpretation of how black nationalism works today in the wake of changing black youth identity.
Black Sexual Politics by Patricia Hill CollinsOne of America's most influential writers on race and gender explores how images of Black sexuality have been used to maintain the color line and how they threaten to spread a new brand of racism around the world today.
John Henrik Clarke
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African-American historian, professor, and pioneer in the creation of Pan-African and Africana studies and professional institutions in academia since the 1960s.
Africans at the Crossroads by John Henrik ClarkeClarke begins with the roots of the African & African-American freedom struggle in the African World. A major section is devoted to five African leaders; the remainder of the essays focus on the conquest of Africa, the Pan-Africanist movement, the freedom struggle in South Africa & other topics.
Carter G. Woodson
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American historian, author, journalist, and founder of the Association for the Study of African American Life and History. Woodson was one of the first scholars to study the history of the African diaspora and African-American history.
Negro Orators and Their Orations by Carter G. WoodsonIn this reprint of these orations, the editor has endeavored to present them as nearly as possible in their original form. No effort has been made to improve the English. These orations are of value to persons studying the development of the Negro in his use of a modern idiom and also in the study of the history of the race. It is in this spirit that these messages are again given to the public.
Robin Kelley
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American historian and academic, Kelley is the Gary B. Nash Professor of American History at UCLA.
Yo' Mama's Disfunktional by Robin D. G. KelleyIn this vibrant, thought-provoking book, Kelley, "the preeminant historian of black popular culture writing today" (Cornel West) shows how the multicolored urban working class is the solution to the ills of American cities. He undermines widespread misunderstandings of black culture and shows how they have contributed to the failure of social policy to save our cities.
Thelonious Monk by Robin D. G. KelleyThelonious Monk is one of the most popular jazz composers and pianists since Duke Ellington, and a cultural icon of cool. This first complete biography is written with full access to the family's archives.
bell hooks
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Gloria Jean Watkins, known by her pen name bell hooks, is an American author, professor, feminist, and social activist. hooks has published more than 30 books, ranging in topics from black men, patriarchy, and masculinity to self-help, engaged pedagogy to personal memoirs, and sexuality.
Talking Back by bell hooksIn childhood, bell hooks was taught that "talking back" meant speaking as an equal to an authority figure and daring to disagree and/or have an opinion. In this collection of personal and theoretical essays, hooks reflects on her signature issues of racism and feminism, politics and pedagogy.
Mary Frances Berry
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American historian, writer, lawyer, activist and professor who focuses on U.S. constitutional and legal, African-American history. Berry is the Geraldine R. Segal Professor of American Social Thought, History and Africana Studies at the University of Pennsylvania.
And Justice for All by Mary Frances BerryThis is the story of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, through its extraordinary fifty years at the heart of the civil rights movement and the struggle for justice in America.
Robyn C. Spencer
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Historian who focuses on Black social protest after World War II, urban and working-class radicalism, and gender. Spencer teaches survey and seminar courses on African American Heritage, Civil rights and Black Power and Black women's history at Lehman College.
The Revolution Has Come by Robyn C. SpencerTraces the Black Panther Party's organizational evolution in Oakland, California, where hundreds of young people came to political awareness and journeyed to adulthood as members. Challenging the belief that the Panthers were a projection of the leadership, Spencer draws on interviews with rank-and-file members, FBI files, and archival materials to examine the impact the organization's internal politics and COINTELPRO's political repression had on its evolution and dissolution.
Cornell West
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African American philosopher, political activist, social critic, author, and public intellectual. West is Professor of the Practice of Public Philosophy at Harvard University and holds the title of Professor Emeritus at Princeton University.
The American Evasion of Philosophy by Cornel WestTaking Emerson as his starting point, Cornel West's basic task in this ambitious enterprise is to chart the emergence, development, decline, and recent resurgence of American pragmatism. John Dewey is the central figure in West's pantheon of pragmatists, but he treats as well such varied mid-century representatives of the tradition as Sidney Hook, C. Wright Mills, W. E. B. Du Bois, Reinhold Niebuhr, and Lionel Trilling.
Democracy Matters by Cornel WestWest returns to the analysis of the arrested development of democracy-both in America and in the crisis-ridden Middle East. In a strikingly original diagnosis, he argues that if America is to become a better steward of democratization around the world, we must first wake up to the long history of imperialist corruption that has plagued our own democracy. Both our failure to foster peace in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the crisis of Islamist anti-Americanism stem largely from hypocrisies in our dealings with the world.
James H. Cone
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American theologian, best known for his advocacy of black theology and black liberation theology. Cone's1969 book Black Theology and Black Power provided a new way to comprehensively define the distinctiveness of theology in the black church.
Black Theology and Black Power by James H. Cone"Newly updated and expanded, this classic work is a product of the Civil Rights and Black Power movements in America during the 1960's. Black Theology & Black Power is James H. Cone's initial attempt to identify liberation as the heart of the Christian gospel, and blackness as the primary mode of God's presence.
God of the Oppressed by James H. ConeIn his reflections on God, Jesus, suffering, and liberation, James H. Cone relates the gospel message to the experience of the black community. But a wider theme of the book is the role that social and historical context plays in framing the questions we address to God as well as the mode of the answers provided.
Angela Davis
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American political activist, philosopher, academic, Marxist feminist, and author. Davis is a professor emerita at the University of California, Santa Cruz.
Annette Gordon-Reed
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American historian and law professor. Gordon-Reed is the Charles Warren Professor of American Legal History at Harvard University, where she is also the Carol K. Pforzheimer Professor at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, and professor of history in the university's Faculty of Arts & Sciences. Gordon-Reed is noted for changing scholarship on Thomas Jefferson regarding his relationship with Sally Hemings and her children.
The Hemingses of Monticello by Annette Gordon-ReedThis epic work tells the story of the Hemingses, a slave family whose close blood ties to American president Thomas Jefferson had been systematically edited out from American history until very recently. This book sets the family's compelling saga against the backdrop of Revolutionary America, Paris on the eve of its own revolution, 1970s Philadelphia and plantation life at Monticello. Much anticipated, this book promises to be the most important history of an American slave family ever written.
Most Blessed of the Patriarchs by Annette Gordon-Reed; Peter S. OnufPulitzer Prize-winning historian and leading Jefferson scholar team up to present an absorbing and revealing character study that finally clarifies the philosophy of Jefferson. The authors explore what they call the "empire" of Jefferson's imagination--his expansive state of mind born of the intellectual influences and life experiences that led him into public life as a modern avatar of the enlightenment, who often likened himself to an ancient figure--"the most blessed of the patriarchs".
Kwame Anthony Appiah
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British-Ghanaian philosopher, cultural theorist, and novelist whose interests include political and moral theory, the philosophy of language and mind, and African intellectual history.
As If: Idealization and Ideals by Kwame Anthony AppiahAppiah demonstrates that a picture one knows to be unreal can be a vehicle for accessing reality. As If explores how strategic untruth plays a critical role in far-flung areas of inquiry: decision theory, psychology, natural science, and political philosophy. A polymath who writes with mainstream clarity, Appiah defends the centrality of the imagination not just in the arts but in science, morality, and everyday life.
Lines of Descent by Kwame Anthony AppiahTraces the twin lineages of Du Bois' American experience and German apprenticeship, showing how they shaped the great African-American scholar's ideas of race and social identity.
Stephen L. Carter
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American law professor at Yale University, writes on legal and social policy, columnist, and best-selling novelist.
Invisible by Stephen L. CarterThe bestselling author delves into his past and discovers the inspiring story of his grandmother's extraordinary life She was black and a woman and a prosecutor, a graduate of Smith College and the granddaughter of slaves, as dazzlingly unlikely a combination as one could imagine in New York of the 1930s--and without the strategy she devised, Lucky Luciano, the most powerful Mafia boss in history, would never have been convicted.
New England White by Stephen L. CarterLemaster Carlyle, the president of the country's most prestigious university, and his wife, Julie, the divinity school's deputy dean, are America's most prominent and powerful African American couple. Driving home through a swirling blizzard late one night, the couple skids off the road. Near the sight of their accident they discover a dead body. To her horror, Julia recognizes the body as a prominent academic and one of her former lovers. In the wake of the death, the icy veneer of their town Elm Harbor, a place Julie calls "the heart of whiteness," begins to crack, having devastating consequences for a prominent local family and sending shock waves all the way to the White House.
Thomas Sowell
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American economist and social theorist who is currently a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. Sowell was born in North Carolina but grew up in Harlem, New York.
Ever Wonder Why? and Other Controversial Essays by Thomas SowellThomas Sowell takes aim at a range of legal, social, racial, educational, and economic issues in this latest collection of his controversial, never boring, always thought-provoking essays. From "gun control myths" to "mealy mouth media" to "free lunch medicine," Sowell gets to the heart of the matters we all care about with his characteristically unsparing candor.
William Julius Wilson
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American sociologist. He is a professor at Harvard University and author of works on urban sociology, race and class issues.
When Work Disappears by William Julius WilsonFor the first time in the 20th century, the majority of adults in the inner cities are not working. In an important and long-awaited study, one of the country's leading sociologists, the acclaimed author of The Truly Disadvantaged, analyzes the disappearance of work and its effects on the inner city of Chicago.
More Than Just Race by William Julius WilsoWilliam Julius Wilson applies an exciting new analytic framework to three politically fraught social problems: the persistence of the inner-city ghetto, the plight of low-skilled black males, and the fragmentation of the African American family. Though the discussion of racial inequality is typically ideologically polarized--conservatives emphasize cultural factors like worldviews and behaviors while liberals emphasize institutional forces--Wilson dares to consider both institutional and cultural factors as causes of the persistence of racial inequality. He reaches the controversial conclusion that, while structural and cultural forces are inextricably linked, public policy can change the racial status quo only by reforming the institutions that reinforce it. This book will dramatically affect policy debates and challenge many of the leaders.
Beverly Daniel Tatum
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Psychologist, administrator, and educator who has conducted research and written books on the topic of racism. Focusing specifically on race in education, racial identity development in teenagers, and assimilation of black families and youth in white neighborhoods.
Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria? by Beverly Daniel TatumThe classic, bestselling book on the psychology of racism-now fully revised and updated Walk into any racially mixed high school and you will see Black, White, and Latino youth clustered in their own groups. Is this self-segregation a problem to address or a coping strategy? Beverly Daniel Tatum, a renowned authority on the psychology of racism, argues that straight talk about our racial identities is essential if we are serious about enabling communication across racial and ethnic divides.
Can We Talk about Race? by Beverly Daniel TatumTatum starts with a warning call about the increasing but under reported re segregation of America. A self described "integration baby"-she was born in 1954-Tatum sees our growing isolation from each other as deeply problematic, and she believes that schools can be key institutions for forging connections across the racial divide.
John McWhorter
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American academic and associate professor of English and comparative literature at Columbia University, where he teaches linguistics, American studies, philosophy, and music history.
The Language Hoax by John H. McWhorterJapanese has a term that covers both green and blue. Russian has separate terms for dark and light blue. Does this mean that Russians perceive these colors differently from Japanese people? Does language control and limit the way we think?This short, opinionated book addresses the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, which argues that the language we speak shapes the way we perceive the world. Linguist John McWhorter argues that while this idea is mesmerizing, it is plainly wrong. It is language that reflects culture and worldview, not the otherway around. The fact that a language has only one word for eat, drink, and smoke doesn't mean its speakers don't process the difference between food and beverage, and those who use the same word for blue and green perceive those two colors just as vividly as others do.McWhorter shows not only how the idea of language as a lens fails but also why we want so badly to believe it: we're eager to celebrate diversity by acknowledging the intelligence of peoples who may not think like we do. Though well-intentioned, our belief in this idea poses an obstacle to a betterunderstanding of human nature and even trivializes the people we seek to celebrate. The reality - that all humans think alike - provides another, better way for us to acknowledge the intelligence of all peoples.
Talking Back, Talking Black by John McWhorterTalking Black takes us on a fascinating tour of a nuanced and complex language that has moved beyond America's borders to become a dynamic force for today's youth culture around the world.
Anthony Abraham Jack
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Assistant Professor at the Harvard Graduate School of Education and Shutzer Assistant Professor at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study.
Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw
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American lawyer, civil rights advocate, philosopher, and a leading scholar of critical race theory who developed the theory of intersectionality. She is a full-time professor at the UCLA School of Law and Columbia Law School, where she specializes in race and gender issues.
Angela P. Harris
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American legal scholar at UC Davis School of Law, in the fields of critical race theory, feminist legal scholarship, and criminal law. She held the position of professor of law at UC Berkeley School of Law, joining the faculty in 1988.
Crossroads, Directions and a New Critical Race Theory by Angela P Harris et al.Critical race theorists assert that both the procedures and the substance of American law are structured to maintain white privilege. The neutrality and objectivity of the law are not just unattainable ideals; they are harmful actions that obscure the law's role in protecting white supremacy. This notion so obvious to some, so unthinkable to others has stimulated and divided legal thinking in this country and, increasingly, abroad. The essays in "Crossroads, Directions," and a New Critical Race Theory all original address this notion in a variety of helpful and exciting ways. They use analysis, personal experience, historical narrative, and many other techniques to explain the importance of looking critically at how race permeates our national consciousness."
And the list goes on . . .
Kemet, Afrocentricity and Knowledge by 
Facing South to Africa by 
What Moves at the Margin by 
A Mercy by 
The Henry Louis Gates, Jr. Reader by 
Black Female Undergraduates on Campus by 
Whistling Vivaldi by 
Young, Gifted, and Black by 
We Want to Do More Than Survive by 
From Black Power to Hip Hop by 
Black Sexual Politics by 
Africans at the Crossroads by 
Marcus Garvey and the Vision of Africa by 
Negro Orators and Their Orations by 
Yo' Mama's Disfunktional by 
Thelonious Monk by 
Talking Back by 
Feminism Is for Everybody by 
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History Teaches Us to Resist by 
And Justice for All by 
The Revolution Has Come by 
The American Evasion of Philosophy by 
Democracy Matters by 
Black Theology and Black Power by 
God of the Oppressed by 
The Hemingses of Monticello by 
Most Blessed of the Patriarchs by 
As If: Idealization and Ideals by 
Lines of Descent by 
Invisible by 
New England White by 
Trickle down Theory and Tax Cuts for the Rich by 
Ever Wonder Why? and Other Controversial Essays by 
When Work Disappears by 
More Than Just Race by 
Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria? by 
Can We Talk about Race? by 
The Language Hoax by 
Talking Back, Talking Black by 
Crossroads, Directions and a New Critical Race Theory by 
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