Biography

Thurgood Marshall brought down the separate-but-equal doctrine, integrated schools, and not only fought for human rights and human dignity but also made them impossible to deny in the courts and in the streets. In this stunning new biography,...

In the spirit of Amy Poehler's Yes Please, Lena Dunham's Not That Kind of Girl, and Roxane Gay's Bad Feminist, a powerful collection of essays about gender, sexuality, race, beauty, Hollywood, and what it means to be a modern woman...

Following the deaths of Trayvon Martin and other black youths in recent years, students on campuses across America have joined professors and activists in calling for justice and increased awareness that Black Lives Matter. In this second edition of his...

Can it ever get better? This is the question Benjamin Watson is asking. In a country aflame with the fallout from the racial divide--in which Ferguson, Charleston, and the Confederate flag dominate the national news, daily seeming to rip the wounds open...

"Words mean more than what is set down on paper," Maya Angelou wrote in her groundbreaking memoir I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. Indeed, Angelou's words have traveled the world and transformed lives--inspiring, strengthening, healing. Through a long...

Universally acclaimed as a musical genius, Miles Davis was one of the most important and influential musicians in the world. Here, Miles speaks out about his extraordinary life. Miles: The Autobiography, like Miles himself, holds nothing back. He speaks...

In Unbowed, Nobel Prize winner Wangari Maathai recounts her extraordinary journey from her childhood in rural Kenya to the world stage. When Maathai founded the Green Belt Movement in 1977, she began a vital poor people's environmental movement, focused...

By twenty-one, Jeff Henderson was making up to $35,000 a week cooking and selling crack cocaine. By twenty-four, he had been sentenced to nineteen and a half years in prison on federal drug trafficking charges. It was an all-too-familiar story for a...

Throughout Maya Angelou's life, from her childhood in Stamps, Arkansas, to her world travels as a bestselling writer, good food has played a central role. Preparing and enjoying homemade meals provides a sense of purpose and calm, accomplishment and...

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

The Second Emancipation, the second work in a trilogy from best-selling author Howard W. French about Africa's pivotal role in shaping world history, underscores Adam Hochschild's contention that French is a "modern-day Copernicus." The title--referring...

A revealing personal life story like no other--enlightening, entertaining, surprising, empowering--and a testament to the world-making power of Black motherhood "You are Celestine," she said. She squatted to push the hair off my face and pull leaves off...