Since Monday, May 25, 2020, in response to the death of George Floyd and the actions of Amy Cooper, protests have occurred around the globe. While many have been peaceful, others have been violent. All have included protesters speaking out against racism and racial inequality. The majority of this has occurred in many major cities of the United States to promote the rights of those who are Black and denounce white supremacy and privilege.
For libraries, despite the COVID-19 pandemic, a universal request has gone out asking for reading on how to keep racism in check, learn the history of racism in the United States, and how to stand with those who are being affected. The following list has been compiled to include many of the books that have been suggested by experts in this topic and includes both non-fiction and fiction.
Please note that not all items on this list have been published recently or are available through the Vicksburg District Library or MeLCat Interlibrary Loan. If you have any questions or comments, including suggestions to possibly add to this list, please contact us at info@vicksburglibrary.org. Thank you.
- American Lynching by Ashraf H. A. Rushdy
- Antiracism: An Introduction by Alex Zamalin
- The Autobiography of Malcom X by Malcolm X
- Begin Again: James Baldwin’s America and Is Urgent Lessons for Our Own by Eddie S. Glaude Jr.
- Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates
- Biased: Uncovering the Hidden Prejudice That Shapes What We See, Think, and Do by Jennifer L. Eberhardt
- Black Feminist Thought: Knowledge, Consciousness, and the Politics of Empowerment by Patricia Hill Collins
- Black Marxism: The Making of the Black Radical Tradition by Cedric J. Robinson
- The Blacker the Berry by Wallace Thurman
- The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison
- Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents by Isabel Wilkerson
- Citizen: An American Lyric by Claudia Rankine
- Cold War Civil Rights: Race and the Image of American Democracy by Mary L. Dudziak
- The Color of Law: A Forgotten History of How Our Government Segregated America by Richard Rothstein
- The Condemnation of Blackness: Race, Crime, and the Making of Modern Urban America by Khalil Gibran Muhammad
- The Cooking Gene: A Journey Through African American Culinary History in the Old South by Michael W. Twitty
- Dog Whistle Politics: How Coded Racial Appeals Have Reinvented Racism and Wrecked the Middle Class by Ian Haney López
- Dying of Whiteness: How the Politics of Racial Resentment is Killing America’s Heartland by Jonathan M. Metzi
- Eloquent Rage: A Black Feminist Discovers Her Superpower by Brittney Cooper
- Fatal Invention: How Science, Politics, and Big Business Re-Create Race in the Twenty-First Century by Dorothy Roberts
- The Fire Next Time by James Baldwin
- The Fire This Time by Randall Kenan
- The Fire This Time: A New Generation Speaks About Race by Jesmyn Ward
- From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation by Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor
- From the War on Poverty to the War on Crime: The Making of Mass Incarceration in America by Elizabeth Kai Hinton
- Give Us the Ballot: The Modern Struggle for Voting Rights in America by Ari Berman
- Habits of Whiteness: A Pragmatist Reconstruction by Terrance MacMullan
- The Half Has Never Been Told: Slavery and the Making of American Capitalism by Edward E. Baptist
- The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas
- Heavy: An American Memoir by Kiese Laymon
- How to Be an Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi
- How We Get Free: Black Feminism and the Combahee River Collective edited by Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor
- I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
- The Inner Work of Racial Justice: Healing Ourselves and Transforming Our Communities Through Mindfulness by Rhonda V. Magee
- Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption by Bryan Stevenson
- Locking Up Our Own: Crime and Punishment in Black America by James Forman
- Me and White Supremacy: Combat Racism, Change the World, and Become a Good Ancestor by Layla F. Saad
- A More Beautiful and Terrible History: The Uses and Misuses of Civil Rights History by Jeanne Theoharis
- The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain by Langston Hughes
- The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness by Michelle Alexander
- The Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead
- North of Slavery: The Negro in the Free States, 1790-1860 by Leon F. Litwack
- One Person, No Vote: How Voter Suppression is Destroying Our Democracy by Carol Anderson
- The Origins of the Urban Crisis: Race and Inequality in Postwar Detroit by Thomas J. Sugrue
- The Price for Their Pound of Flesh: The Value of the Enslaved, From Womb to Grave, in the Building of a Nation by Daina Ramey Berry
- Are Prisons Obsolete? by Angela Y. Davis
- The Possessive Investment in Whiteness: How White People Profit from Identity Politics by George Lipsitz
- The Racial Healing Handbook: Practical Activities to Help You Challenge Privilege, Confront Systemic Racism & Engage in Collective Healing by Anneliese A. Singh
- Racism Without Racists by Eduardo Bonilla-Silva
- Raising White Kids: Bringing Up Children in a Racially Unjust America by Jennifer Harvey
- Reconstruction: America’s Unfinished Revolution, 1863-1877 by Eric Foner
- Redefining Realness: My Path to Womanhood, Identity, Love, and So Much More by Janet Mock
- Roots by Alex Haley
- Sister Citizen: Shame, Stereotypes, and Black Women in America by Melissa V. Harris-Perry
- Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches by Audre Lorde
- Slavery by Another Name: The Re-enslavement of Black Americans From the Civil War to World War II by Douglas A. Blackmon
- So You Want to Talk About Race by Ijeoma Oluo
- Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America by Ibram X. Kendi
- Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You by Jason Reynolds & Ibram X. Kendi
- Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston
- They Can’t Kill Us All: Ferguson, Baltimore, and a New Era in America’s Racial Justice Movement by Wesley Lowery
- This Bridge Called My Back: Writings by Radical Women of Color edited by Cherríe Moraga and Gloria Anzaldúa
- Too Heavy a Load: Black Women in Defense of Themselves, 1894-1994 by Deborah G. White
- The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead
- Waiting ‘til the Midnight Hour: A Narrative History of Black Power in America by Peniel E. Joseph
- The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America’s Great Migration by Isabel Wilkerson
- Well-Read Black Girl: Finding Our Stories, Discovering Ourselves edited by Glory Edim
- The Wellbeing Handbook for Overcoming Everyday Racism: How to Be Resilient in the Face of Discrimination and Microaggressions by Susan Cousins
- West Indian Immigrants: A Black Success Story? by Suzanne Model
- When Affirmative Action Was White: An Untold History of Racial Inequality in Twentieth-Century America by Ira Katznelson
- When and Where I Enter: The Impact of Black Women on Race and Sex in America by Paula Giddings
- White Flight: Atlanta and the Making of Modern Conservatism by Kevin Kruse
- White Fragility: Why It’s So Hard for White People to Talk about Racism by Robin DiAngelo
- White Rage: The Unspoken Truth of Our Racial Divide by Carol Anderson
- White Tears/Brown Scars: How White Feminism Betrays Women of Color by Ruby Hamad