In this segment: African American Literature and Memoir. (See the full list of my 2016 reading here.) African American Literature continues to be one of my most-read genres. I find it intellectually challenging as well as emotionally moving. 2016’s reading was no exception. The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man by James Weldon Johnson | This was a… Continue Reading
In honor of the birthday (yesterday) of one of my intellectual heroes, I thought I’d write a few words. I first encountered W.E.B. Du Bois in a college US history survey in my second year. We read an excerpt from The Souls of Black Folk and I was moved to read the whole book that… Continue Reading
I finished 29 books in 2014. Considering what else we have going on in our lives, I think that’s a pretty good number, though I’m always interested in reading more. Since my reviews came out to over 2,000 words, I’ve decided to break things up a bit. Below is entry 1 of 2. Feel free… Continue Reading
On Friday, for our last session of class, I taught my students about contemporary inequality in America and the process of racial segregation in the Ferguson area. I’d planned this since the summer, when I learned that I would have one more day of instruction than usual. I had no idea that the grand jury’s decision… Continue Reading
I’m reading Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie right now. It fit my recent reading interests and is getting all kinds of buzz, so I decided to give it a try. It’s deserving of the praise and I’m sure I’ll have more to say when I’m done. For now, I just want to highlight one passage that describes… Continue Reading
It seems our family is full of Baltimore lately, a city we’ve never visited. But my wife’s been reading Homicide: A Year on the Killing Streets, I’ve been reading The Beautiful Struggle, and we’ve both been listening to Serial. From these sources, it’s not a pretty picture. In reading Ta-Nehisi Coates’ fantastic memoir, I ran across… Continue Reading
By chance, I saw the news about the Texas voter ID law just before re-reading W.E.B. Du Bois’ “Returning Soldiers” from 1919. Du Bois’ piece is a stirring call to the black soldiers returning from WWI to now engage in the fight for democracy at home. In it, he lists the sins of this nation… Continue Reading
Right now I’m reading Cry, the Beloved Country, a novel set in South Africa and published in 1948. As I don’t know much about South African history, it is an eye-opening and moving account. But it is also a bit dated. There is a lot of discussion about whether apartheid will ever end, whether black Africans… Continue Reading
This summer I assigned myself six canonical works of 20th century African American literature. This was prompted in part by a student last quarter commenting that he had read either Invisible Man or Native Son (I’ve forgotten which) and raving about the book. When he asked whether I had read it I had to confess… Continue Reading
