African American Nonfiction

African American literature is the body of literature produced in the United States by writers of African descent. It begins with the works of such late 18th-century writers as Phillis Wheatley. Before the high point of enslaved people narratives, African-American literature was dominated by autobiographical spiritual narratives. The genre known as slave narratives in the 19th century were accounts by people who had generally escaped from slavery, about their journeys to freedom and ways they claimed their lives.

In the wake of his deeply powerful viral videos ("Before You Call the Cops" and "Walking While Black"), Tyler Merritt shares his experiences as a black man in America with truth, humor, and poignancy. Tyler Merritt's video "Before You Call the Cops" has been viewed millions of times. He's...

Rewriting the pernicious, enduring relationship between blackness and animality in the history of Western science and philosophy, Becoming Human breaks open the rancorous debate between Black critical theory and posthumanism. Through the cultural terrain of literature by Toni Morrison, Nalo Hopkinson, Audre Lorde, and Octavia Butler, the art of Wangechi Mutu and Ezrom Legae, and the oratory of Frederick Douglass, Zakiyyah Iman Jackson both critiques and displaces the racial logic that has dominated scientific thought since the Enlightenment.

In this original and trenchant work, Christina Sharpe interrogates literary, visual, cinematic, and quotidian representations of Black life that comprise what she calls the "orthography of the wake". Activating multiple registers of "wake" - the path behind a ship, keeping watch with the dead, coming to consciousness - Sharpe illustrates how Black lives are swept up and animated by the afterlives of slavery, and she delineates what survives despite such insistent violence and negation.

The Plasma Pioneer reveals the remarkable true story of Charles Richard Drew, the African American physician whose scientific genius collided with the brutal realities of segregated America. When the U.S. military demanded that blood donations be segregated by race—despite Drew's own research proving the practice scientifically baseless—he made a decision that would define his legacy: he resigned from the program he created rather than compromise his principles.

Emmy Award-winning storyteller Bobby Norfolk brings his electrifying energy to world folktales (African, Eastern European, Appalachian, and Irish traditions), to the delight of all ages. From Anansi, the African trickster, to Jack, the bumbling, lucky, persevering Everyman of traditional stories, Norfolk's characters instruct while they entertain.

You gotta know the rules to play the game. Ball is life. Take it to the hoop. Soar. What can we imagine for ourselves? What if we were the star players, moving and grooving through the game of life? What if we had our own rules of the game to help us get what we want, what we aspire to, what will enrich our lives? The Playbook is intended to provide inspiration for kids ages 10 and up to help them succeed on and off the court.

“One of the nation’s most prominent civil rights leaders” (Washington Post), a New York Times bestselling author, community organizer, investigative journalist, Ivy League professor, and former head of the NAACP, Ben Jealous draws from a life lived on America’s racial fault line to...

Any misunderstandings between Blacks and Whites in today's society tend to stem from the misconceptions about Blacks that have been allowed to thrive throughout the ages. The only way to help abolish stereotypes is to help present a more complete picture of the Black people throughout history. Black History for Beginners covers a rich but often ignored history and chronicles the Black struggle from capture and enslavement in Africa through the civil rights movement and up to today and the new and different kinds of struggles that Black people face today.

From the New York Times-bestselling author of Stony the Road and one of our most important voices on the African-American experience, a powerful new history of the Black church in America as the Black community's abiding rock and its fortress. The companion book to the upcoming PBS series. For...

Monumental in scope and vividly detailed, Chocolate City tells the tumultuous, four-century story of race and democracy in our nation's capital. Emblematic of the ongoing tensions between America's expansive democratic promises and its enduring racial realities, Washington often has served as a national battleground for contentious issues, including slavery, segregation, civil rights, the drug war, and gentrification.

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER “The story of modern medicine and bioethics—and, indeed, race relations—is refracted beautifully, and movingly.”—Entertainment Weekly NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE FROM HBO STARRING OPRAH WINFREY AND ROSE BYRNE ONE OF THE “MOST INFLUENTIAL” (CNN)...

Part memoir, part call to action, this young readers’ edition dives into the inspiring life of the late U.S. Representative Elijah Cummings—from childhood through his time as chairman of the House Oversight Committee—and his tireless fight for justice. Growing up as the child of former...

Meet extraordinary black heroes throughout history—biographies for kids ages 8 to 12. You’re invited to meet ancient Egyptian rulers, brilliant scientists, legendary musicians, and civil rights activists—all in the same book! Black Heroes introduces you to 51 black leaders and role models from both history and modern times. This black history book for kids features inspirational biographies of trailblazers from the United States, Egypt, Britain, and more.

George Scott peered at the nearby Union fortress. Something miraculous was taking place! Three enslaved men had entered but had not been cast out. To Scott, the fortress must be a sanctuary. A place where the three would be safe from capture and harm—never to return to the Confederate South. But exactly why were they granted refuge?

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

Adapted from Emmanuel Acho's New York Times bestseller Uncomfortable Conversations with a Black Man, comes an essential young listeners edition aimed at opening a dialogue about systemic racism with our youngest generation. Young people have the power to affect sweeping change, and the key to...

In The 50th Law, hip hop and pop culture icon 50 Cent (aka Curtis Jackson) joins forces with Robert Greene, bestselling author of The 48 Laws of Power, to write a “bible” for success in life and work based on a single principle: fear nothing. With stories from 50 Cent's life on the streets...

Lost Black Voices of the 19th Century True Stories of Freedom, Literature, and Erasure They wrote. They fought. They dreamed. Then history erased them. In this groundbreaking companion to The Lost Lives of the 19th Century, acclaimed author Richard Fleischman brings to light the forgotten voices of Black writers, thinkers, and storytellers who shaped American history—only to be silenced by it. From William Wells Brown’s defiant lectures to Harriet E. Wilson’s trailblazing novel, from newspaper editors and poets to spiritual autobiographers and schoolteachers, this book uncovers the ...

I Know I've Been Changed is an anthology featuring the testimonies of 17 women of God's transformative power! Featuring co-writers: Tina Michelle Baker Ingrid M. Buchanan Shawndell Burney-Speaks Linda D. Coleman Bernita Jackson Dorsharica A. Jefferson Cheryl Johnson Tracy T. Johnson Sharri Joyner Pastor Adrian Partlow Bernadette Rhodes Billika Rodgers Dr. Angela M. Sinkfield-Gray Wenifred Emily Thomas CaMilla Williams Courtney Williams