And Still I Rise: Black America Since MLK - Hardcover

by Henry L. Gates (Author), Kevin M. Burke (Author)

The companion book to Henry Louis Gates, Jr.'s PBS series, And Still I Rise--a timeline and chronicle of the past 50 years of black history in the U.S. in more than 350 photos.

Beginning with the assassination of Malcolm X in February 1965, And Still I Rise: From Black Power to the White House explores the last half-century of the African American experience. More than fifty years after the passage of the Civil Rights Act and the birth of Black Power, the United States has both a black president and black CEOs running Fortune 500 companies--and a large black underclass beset by persistent poverty, inadequate education, and an epidemic of incarceration. Harvard professor and scholar Henry Louis Gates, Jr. raises disturbing and vital questions about this dichotomy. How did the African American community end up encompassing such profound contradictions? And what will "the black community" mean tomorrow?

Gates takes readers through the major historical events and untold stories of the sixty years that have irrevocably shaped both the African American experience and the nation as a whole, from the explosive social and political changes of the 1960s, into the 1970s and 1980s--eras characterized by both prosperity and neglect--through the turn of the century to today, taking measure of such racial flashpoints as the Tawana Brawley case, OJ Simpson's murder trial, the murders of Amadou Diallo and Trayvon Martin, and debates around the NYPD's "stop and frisk" policies. Even as it surveys the political and social evolution of black America, And Still I Rise is also a celebration of the accomplishments of black artists, musicians, writers, comedians, and thinkers who have helped to define American popular culture and to change our world.

Back Jacket

A companion to the PBS series And Still I Rise, hosted and produced by the preeminent harvard scholar Henry Louis Gates, Jr.

This illustrated chronology details the most salient events of the last half century in African American history, from the climactic moments of the civil rights movement--the assassinations of Malcolm X and Martin Luther King, Jr., and the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965--and the once unimaginable, and now nearly complete, two-term presidency of Barack H. Obama.

From Selma to Ferguson, affirmative action to the Forbes list, Motown to Def Jam, "Black Is Beautiful" to "Black Lives Matter," And Still I Rise is a record of a people who have made astonishing progress since the King years, climbing to the highest rungs of society and revolutionizing global culture, but who also confront daunting challenges within a nation still struggling over issues of inequality.

The authors' year-by-year approach vividly chronicles the people and events that have irrevocably shaped the African American community and the nation as a whole. At the root of And Still I Rise is a seemingly simple question: What binds African Americans together? Is it the inheritance of memories and experiences across time? Is it the legacy born of fighting a system of laws that, for such a long portion of American history, drew a color line based on "one drop of blood?" Is it the common cause that has come from fighting for freedom and equality, or the cultural ties that unite a people through the cultural and social institutions, the sacred and secular forms and songs that speak to their epic journey? Or, given the sheer diversity and divergence of some forty million people, is it even possible to think of this "nation-within-a-nation" as a unified cultural or social entity at all?

Accompanying photographs of signal moments in the political and social evolution of Black America are images of the accomplishments of black thinkers and artists, entertainers and writers, sports figures and businesswomen and -men, professionals and workers, who have helped to define American culture, in all of its manifestations. Comprehensive but in no way exhaustive, And Still I Rise is intended to start a conversation, within and between generations and races.