History

National Book Critics Circle 2021 Biography Finalist 53rd NAACP Image Award Nominee: Outstanding Literary Work - Biography/Autobiography "[A] riveting and timely exploration of Hamer's life. . . . Brilliantly constructed to be both forward and backward...

Let residents tell you what it's been like to live in D.C.'s most gentrified neighborhood. When Gretchen Wharton came to Shaw in 1946, the houses were full of families that looked like hers: lower-income, African American, two parents with kids. The...

"Denmark Vesey's Garden reveals that the long struggle over how Americans remember slavery has been inseparable from the long struggle for racial justice."--Ibram X. Kendi "Kytle and Roberts's meticulous research, compelling writing, and thoughtful...

Everyone knows that Washington, D.C. is a city of secrets. There are secrets in the White House, the Capitol, and the Supreme Court. There are secret files in the Pentagon, the FBI, CIA, NSA, and a veritable alphabet soup of federal agencies. Yet the...

In lecture/essay format, Dr. Ben identifies and corrects myths about the inferiority and primitiveness of the indigenous African peoples and their descendants. Order Africa Mother of Western Civilization here.

From the mind of brilliant historian Robin Kelley comes the first full biography of legendary jazz musician Thelonious Monk, including full access to the family's archives, dozens of interviews, and an afterword for Monk's 2017 centennial. Thelonious...

Discover the growing community of Black floriculture leading the new vanguard in flowers. Black Flora is the first book to feature profiles of contemporary Black experts innovating in the world of flowers. Author and longtime gardener, Teresa Speight,...

A NEW YORK TIMES TOP TEN BOOK OF THE YEAR - FINALIST FOR THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD IN FICTION - A READ WITH JENNA BOOK CLUB PICK - NATIONAL BESTSELLER - Two top women gladiators fight for their freedom within a depraved private prison system not...

An urgent new chapter in the history of the Catholic Church and America's reckoning with its founding narrative"Outstanding . . . an incredible project of research, deciphering, and storytelling, and a devastating indictment not only of Georgetown but...

This comparison of the political and social systems of Europe and black Africa from antiquity to the formation of modern states demonstrates the black contribution to the development of Western civilization.

A Best Book of 2021 by NPR and The Washington Post   Part graphic novel, part memoir, Wake is an imaginative tour-de-force that tells the "powerful" (The New York Times Book Review) story of women-led slave revolts and chronicles scholar Rebecca...

In The Black Side of the River, sociolinguist Jessi Grieser draws on ten years of interviews with dozens of residents of Anacostia-a historically Black neighborhood in Washington, DC-to explore the impact of urban change on Black culture, identity,...

Hundreds of stunning images from black history have long been buried in The New York Times archives. by product of them were published by The Times -- until now. UNSEEN uncovers these never-before published photographs and tells the stories behind them...

The black experience in America--starting from its origins in western Africa up to 1961--is examined in this seminal study from a prominent African American figure. The entire historical timeline of African Americans is addressed, from the Colonial...

NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FINALIST - KIRKUS PRIZE FINALIST - A renowned historian traces the life of a single object handed down through three generations of Black women to craft an extraordinary testament to people who are left out of the archives.NAMED ONE...

Journalist. Suffragist. Antilynching crusader. In 1862, Ida B. Wells was born enslaved in Holly Springs, Mississippi. In 2020, she won a Pulitzer Prize. Ida B. Wells committed herself to the needs of those who did not have power. In the eyes of the FBI,...