Afrofuturism
This page features a small selection of UConn library and external resources to support learning and research pertaining to Afrofuturism. This list is meant to be exploratory and is not a comprehensive representation or list of the library's holdings.
For additional assistance, please contact Samuel Boss, at samuel.boss@uconn.edu.
The term Afrofuturism was coined by Mark Dery in Flame Wars: The Discourse of CyberCulture (1994, pg 180). Dery described it as: "Speculative fiction that treats African-American themes and addresses African American concerns in the context of twentieth-century technoculture and...that appropriates images of technology and a prosthetically enhanced future-might.... Afrofuturism gives rise to a troubling antimony: Can a community whose past has been deliberately rubbed out, and whose energies have subsequently been consumed by the search for legible traces of its history, imagine possible futures?"
Essential Readings:
Flame Wars by
"Flame Wars," the verbal firefights that take place between disembodied combatants on electronic bulletin boards, remind us that our interaction with the world is increasingly mediated by computers. Bit by digital bit we are being "Borged," as devotees of Star Trek: The Next Generation would have it--transformed into cyborgian hybrids of technology and biology through our ever more frequent interaction with machines, or with one another through technological interfaces. The subcultural practices of the "incurably informed," to borrow the cyberpunk novelist Pat Cadigan's coinage, offer a precognitive glimpse of mainstream culture in the near future, when many of us will be part-time residents in virtual communities. Yet, as the essays in this expanded edition of a special issue of the South Atlantic Quarterly confirm, there is more to fringe computer culture than cyberspace. Within these pages, readers will encounter flame warriors; new age mutant ninja hackers; technopagans for whom the computer is an occult engine; and William Gibson's "Agrippa," a short story on software that can only be read once because it gobbles itself up as soon as the last page is reached. Here, too, is Lady El, an African American cleaning woman reincarnated as an all-powerful cyborg; devotees of on-line swinging, or "compu-sex"; the teleoperated weaponry and amok robots of the mechanical performance art group, Survival Research Laboratories; an interview with Samuel Delany, and more. Rallying around Fredric Jameson's call for a cognitive cartography that "seeks to endow the individual subject with some new heightened sense of place in the global system," the contributors to Flame Wars have sketched a corner of that map, an outline for a wiring diagram of a terminally wired world. Contributors. Anne Balsamo, Gareth Branwyn, Scott Bukatman, Pat Cadigan, Gary Chapman, Erik Davis, Manuel De Landa, Mark Dery, Julian Dibbell, Marc Laidlaw, Mark Pauline, Peter Schwenger, Vivian Sobchack, Claudia Springer
Call Number: QA76.9.C66 F55 1994ISBN: 0822315319Publication Date: 1994-12-27
Kalahari Hopscotch, or notes toward a twenty-volume Afrocentric futurist manifesto in Flyboy 2: the Greg Tate reader by
Since launching his career at the Village Voice in the early 1980s Greg Tate has been one of the premiere critical voices on contemporary Black music, art, literature, film, and politics. Flyboy 2 provides a panoramic view of the past thirty years of Tate's influential work. Whether interviewing Miles Davis or Ice Cube, reviewing an Azealia Banks mixtape or Suzan-Lori Parks's Topdog/Underdog, discussing visual artist Kara Walker or writer Clarence Major, or analyzing the ties between Afro-futurism, Black feminism, and social movements, Tate's resounding critical insights illustrate how race, gender, and class become manifest in American popular culture. Above all, Tate demonstrates through his signature mix of vernacular poetics and cultural theory and criticism why visionary Black artists, intellectuals, aesthetics, philosophies, and politics matter to twenty-first-century America.
Call Number: eBookISBN: 9780822373995Publication Date: 2016-08-04
Afrofuturism is...
is a multiverse that spans media, and genres. Its inventors and visionaries imagine possible future realities in worlds enriched with new technologies, engaging with technology in creative practice or utilizing current or future tech to re-imagine Black pasts. Often intertwining the scientific and the ancestral, Afrofuturists reach back and forth across time, space, and dimensions to construct new worlds and ways of being. Afrofuturism is resistance and liberation.
Image: Art installation by Alisha Wormsley in Detroit Michigan, 2019. Photo by Steve Neavling, courtesy of the Detroit Metro Times.
Afrofuturism: the world of black sci-fi and fantasy culture by
2014 Locus Awards Finalist, Nonfiction Category In this hip, accessible primer to the music, literature, and art of Afrofuturism, author Ytasha Womack introduces readers to the burgeoning community of artists creating Afrofuturist works, the innovators from the past, and the wide range of subjects they explore. From the sci-fi literature of Samuel Delany, Octavia Butler, and N. K. Jemisin to the musical cosmos of Sun Ra, George Clinton, and the Black Eyed Peas' will.i.am, to the visual and multimedia artists inspired by African Dogon myths and Egyptian deities, the book's topics range from the "alien" experience of blacks in America to the "wake up" cry that peppers sci-fi literature, sermons, and activism. With a twofold aim to entertain and enlighten, Afrofuturists strive to break down racial, ethnic, and social limitations to empower and free individuals to be themselves.
Call Number: PN3433.5 .W66 2013ISBN: 1613747969Publication Date: 2013-10-01
Afrofuturism Rising: the literary prehistory of a movement by
Growing out of the music scene, afrofuturism has emerged as an important aesthetic through films such as Black Panther and Get Out. While the significance of these sonic and visual avenues for afrofuturism cannot be underestimated, literature remains fundamental to understanding its full dimensions. Isiah Lavender's Afrofuturism Rising explores afrofuturism as a narrative practice that enables users to articulate the interconnection between science, technology, and race across centuries. By engaging with authors as diverse as Phillis Wheatley, David Walker, Frederick Douglass, Harriet Ann Jacobs, Samuel R. Delany Jr., Pauline Hopkins, Zora Neale Hurston, and Richard Wright, Afrofuturism Rising extends existing scholarly conversations about who creates and what is created via science fiction. Through a trans-historical rereading of texts by these authors as science fiction, Lavender highlights the ways black experience in America has always been an experience of spatial and temporal dislocation akin to science fiction. Compelling and ambitious in scope, Afrofuturism Rising redefines both science fiction and literature as a whole.
Call Number: PS153.N5 L385 2019ISBN: 9780814214138Publication Date: 2019-10-09
Black Utopia: the history of an idea from black nationalism to Afrofuturism by
Alex Zamalin offers a groundbreaking examination of African American visions of utopia and their counterutopian counterparts. Considering figures linked to racial separatism, postracialism, anticolonialism, Pan-Africanism, and Afrofuturism, he argues that the black utopian tradition continues to challenge American political thought and culture.
Call Number: eBookISBN: 9780231547253Publication Date: 2019-09-23
Bodyminds Reimagined: (dis)ability, race, and gender in black women's speculative fiction by
In Bodyminds Reimagined Sami Schalk traces how black women's speculative fiction complicates the understanding of bodyminds--the intertwinement of the mental and the physical--in the context of race, gender, and (dis)ability. Bridging black feminist theory with disability studies, Schalk demonstrates that this genre's political potential lies in the authors' creation of bodyminds that transcend reality's limitations. She reads (dis)ability in neo-slave narratives by Octavia Butler (Kindred) and Phyllis Alesia Perry (Stigmata) not only as representing the literal injuries suffered under slavery, but also as a metaphor for the legacy of racial violence. The fantasy worlds in works by N. K. Jemisin, Shawntelle Madison, and Nalo Hopkinson--where werewolves have obsessive-compulsive-disorder and blind demons can see magic--destabilize social categories and definitions of the human, calling into question the very nature of identity. In these texts, as well as in Butler's Parable series, able-mindedness and able-bodiedness are socially constructed and upheld through racial and gendered norms. Outlining (dis)ability's centrality to speculative fiction, Schalk shows how these works open new social possibilities while changing conceptualizations of identity and oppression through nonrealist contexts.
Call Number: eBookISBN: 9780822371830Publication Date: 2018-03-15
Dark Matter: a century of speculative fiction from the African diaspora by
This volume introduces black science fiction, fantasy, and speculative fiction writers to the generations of readers who have not had the chance to explore the scope and diversity among African-American writers.
Call Number: PS648.S3 D37 2000ISBN: 0446525839Publication Date: 2000-07-18
Dark Matter: Reading the Bones by
Dark Matter is the first and only series to bring together the works of black SF and fantasy writers. The first volume was featured in the New York Times, which named it a Notable Book of the Year.
Call Number: PS648.S3 D257 2005ISBN: 0446693774Publication Date: 2005-02-01
Distributed blackness : African American cybercultures by
'Distributed Blackness' places blackness at the very center of internet culture. André Brock Jr. claims issues of race and ethnicity as inextricable from and formative of contemporary digital culture in the United States. It analyzes a host of platforms and practices (from Black Twitter to Instagram, YouTube, and app development) to trace how digital media have reconfigured the meanings and performances of African American identity.
Call Number: eBookISBN: 9781479811908Publication Date: 2020
Literary Afrofuturism in the Twenty-First Century by
In Literary Afrofuturism in the Twenty-First Century, eminent contributors pay tribute to Afrofuturism as a powerful and evolving aesthetic practice that communicates the experience of science, technology, and race across centuries, continents, and cultures. While Ryan Coogler and Janelle Monáe may have helped bring the genre into contemporary pop consciousness, it in fact extends back to the writing of eighteenth-century poet Phyllis Wheatley and has continued in the work of Samuel R. Delany, Octavia E. Butler, N. K. Jemisin, and many others. In examining this heritage, contributors in this volume question generic boundaries, recover lost artists and introduce new ones, and explore how the meteoric rise of a new, pan-African speculative literary tradition may or may not connect with Afrofuturism. Additionally, the editors have marshaled some of today's most exciting writers for a roundtable discussion of the genre: Bill Campbell, Minister Faust, Nalo Hopkinson, N. K. Jemisin, Chinelo Onwualu, Nisi Shawl, and Nick Wood. Pioneering author and editor Sheree R. Thomas limns how black women have led new developments in contemporary Afrofuturism, and artist Stacey Robinson's illustrations orient readers to the spirited themes of this enduring and consequential literary tradition. Use Contributors only is there is room (if not will use on marketing material)
Call Number: PS153.N5 L476 2020ISBN: 9780814214459Publication Date: 2020-08-20
Queer Times, Black Futures by
Finalist, 2019 Lambda Literary Award in LGBTQ Studies A profound intellectual engagement with Afrofuturism and the philosophical questions of space and time Queer Times, Black Futures considers the promises and pitfalls of imagination, technology, futurity, and liberation as they have persisted in and through racial capitalism. Kara Keeling explores how the speculative fictions of cinema, music, and literature that center black existence provide scenarios wherein we might imagine alternative worlds, queer and otherwise. In doing so, Keeling offers a sustained meditation on contemporary investments in futurity, speculation, and technology, paying particular attention to their significance to queer and black freedom. Keeling reads selected works, such as Sun Ra?s 1972 film Space is the Place and the 2005 film The Aggressives, to juxtapose the Afrofuturist tradition of speculative imagination with the similar ?speculations? of corporate and financial institutions. In connecting a queer, cinematic reordering of time with the new possibilities technology offers, Keeling thinks with and through a vibrant conception of the imagination as a gateway to queer times and black futures, and the previously unimagined spaces that they can conjure.
Call Number: HQ76.27.A37 K44 2019ISBN: 9780814748336Publication Date: 2019-04-16
Sun Ra's Chicago : Afrofuturism & the city by
"William T. Sites details the life of visionary musician Sun Ra in Chicago, from 1946 until 1961. Sun Ra's South Side was a site of unorthodox religious and cultural activism where Afrocentric philosophies flourished, storefront prophets sold "dream-book bibles," and Elijah Muhammad was building the Nation of Islam. It was also an unruly musical crossroads where styles circulated and mashed together in clubs and community dancehalls. Sun Ra drew from a vast array of intellectual sources (radical nationalism, antinomian Christianity, black mythology, and science fiction) and from multiple musical traditions (swing, jazz, blues, Latin dance music, "space-age pop," and other exotica) to promulgate visions of the city that did not conform to the orthodoxies of metropolitan elites, black or white"-- Provided by publisher.
Call Number: eBookISBN: 9780226732244Publication Date: 2020
"The Comet", in Darkwater: Voices from within the Veil by
First published in 1920, this groundbreaking work by the pioneering African American scholar W. E. B. Du Bois is not only original and probing in its brilliant ideas but also experimental in presentation, ranging from detailed sociopolitical analyses to lyrical and poetic presentations. After an opening autobiographical essay, Du Bois launches a series of critical commentaries on some of the most important issues pertaining to white-black relations. Perhaps the most provocative of these, titled "The Souls of White Folk," presents the first major analysis in Western intellectual history of white identity and the meaning of whiteness. In a trenchant assessment he explores the arrogance of the white perspective that tries to "make children believe that every great soul the world ever saw was a white man's soul." Many of his criticisms, in this essay and in others, of a world social and economic system that marginalizes people of color still resonate today, especially in debates over globalization. Another still very relevant issue addressed in this book was the fate of Africa after colonialism. Du Bois was also farsighted in his advocacy of women's rights, in his emphasis on the critical importance of childhood education for all races, and in his critiques of an unjust economic system that concentrates power and wealth in the hands of a few. Complete with an insightful introduction by University of Florida Graduate Research Professor of Sociology Joe Feagin, this new edition of a classic work in Black Studies will make available to a wide audience the influential ideas of a leading African American scholar and advocate of reform.
Call Number: E185.61 .D83 2003ISBN: 1591020573Publication Date: 2003-01-01
Akata Witch by
"Nnedi Okorafor writes glorious futures and fabulous fantasies. Her characters take your heart and squeeze it; her worlds open your mind to new things." -- Neil Gaiman, author of The Graveyard Book and American Gods Affectionately dubbed "the Nigerian Harry Potter," Akata Witch weaves together a heart-pounding tale of magic, mystery, and finding one's place in the world. Perfect for fans of Children of Blood and Bone! Sunny Nwazue lives in Nigeria, but she was born in New York City. Her features are West African, but she's albino. She's a terrific athlete, but can't go out into the sun to play soccer. There seems to be no place where she fits in. And then she discovers something amazing--she is a "free agent" with latent magical power. And she has a lot of catching up to do. Soon she's part of a quartet of magic students, studying the visible and invisible, learning to change reality. But as she's finding her footing, Sunny and her friends are asked by the magical authorities to help track down a career criminal who knows magic, too. Will their training be enough to help them combat a threat whose powers greatly outnumber theirs? World Fantasy Award-winning author Nnedi Okorafor blends magic and adventure to create a lush world. Her writing has been called "stunning" by The New York Times and her fans include Neil Gaiman, Rick Riordan, John Green, Ursula K. Le Guin, and many more! Raves for Nnedi Okorafor's writing: "There's more imagination on a page of Nnedi Okorafor's work than in whole volumes of ordinary fantasy epics." --Ursula K. Le Guin, award-winning author of A Wizard of Earthsea "The most imaginative, gripping, enchanting fantasy novels I have ever read!" --Laurie Halse Anderson, National Book Award finalist and New York Times bestselling author of Speak "I always loved science fiction, but I didn't feel I was part of it--until I read first Octavia Butler, and now Nnedi Okorafor." --Whoopi Goldberg "Highly original stuff, episode after amazing episode, full of color, life, and death. Nnedi Okorafor's work is wonderful!" --Diana Wynne Jones, award-winning author of The Chronicles of Chrestomanci "Jam-packed with mythological wonders." --Rick Riordan, #1 New York Times bestselling author of the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series "Okorafor's imagination is stunning." --The New York Times Book Review
Call Number: PS3615.K67 A53 2017ISBN: 9780142420911Publication Date: 2017-07-11
Black Panther: A nation under our feet, Book 1 by
A new era begins for the Black Panther! MacArthur Genius and National Book Award-winning writer T-Nehisi Coates (BETWEEN THE WORLD AND ME) takes the helm, confronting T'Challa with a dramatic upheaval in Wakanda that will make leading the African nation tougher than ever before. When a superhuman terrorist group that calls itself The People sparks a violent uprising, the land famed for its incredible technology and proud warrior traditions will be thrown into turmoil. If Wakanda is to survive, it must adapt--but can its monarch, one in a long line of Black Panthers, survive the necessary change? Heavy lies the head that wears the cowl! COLLECTING: Black Panther 1-4, Fantastic Four (1961) 52
Call Number: PN6728.B519338 C628 2017ISBN: 9781302900533Publication Date: 2016-09-13
Blake; or, the Huts of America by
Martin R. Delany's Blake (c. 1860) tells the story of Henry Blake's escape from a southern plantation and his travels in the U.S., Canada, Africa, and Cuba on a mission to unite blacks of the Atlantic region in the struggle for freedom. Jerome McGann's edition offers the first correct printing of the work and an authoritative introduction.
Call Number: Print & eBookISBN: 9780674973367Publication Date: 2017-02-13
Children of Blood and Bone by
To check out a copy of this book, please submit an interlibrary loan request! Instant New York Times Bestseller TIME Top 100 Fantasy Books of All Time TIME Best YA Books of All Time TIME 100: Most Influential People of 2020 New York Times Notable Children's Books of 2018 TIME Top 10 Best YA and Children's Books of 2018 NPR's Book Concierge 2018 Great Reads List Buzzfeed's 24 Best YA Books of 2018 Bustle's Top 25 Best Young Adults Books of 2018 2018 Kirkus Prize Finalist YALSA William C. Morris YA Debut Award Finalist Paste Magazine's 30 Best YA Novels of 2018 Newsweek's 61 Best Books from 2018 Boston Globe's Best Children's Books of 2018 Publishers Weekly Best YA Books of 2018 School Library Journal Best Books of 2018 2019 YALSA Teen's Top Ten List With five starred reviews, Tomi Adeyemi's West African-inspired fantasy debut, and instant #1 New York Times Bestseller, conjures a world of magic and danger, perfect for fans of Leigh Bardugo and Sabaa Tahir. They killed my mother. They took our magic. They tried to bury us. Now we rise. Zélie Adebola remembers when the soil of Orïsha hummed with magic. Burners ignited flames, Tiders beckoned waves, and Zélie's Reaper mother summoned forth souls. But everything changed the night magic disappeared. Under the orders of a ruthless king, maji were killed, leaving Zélie without a mother and her people without hope. Now Zélie has one chance to bring back magic and strike against the monarchy. With the help of a rogue princess, Zélie must outwit and outrun the crown prince, who is hell-bent on eradicating magic for good. Danger lurks in Orïsha, where snow leoponaires prowl and vengeful spirits wait in the waters. Yet the greatest danger may be Zélie herself as she struggles to control her powers and her growing feelings for an enemy. "A phenomenon." --Entertainment Weekly "The epic I've been waiting for." --New York Times-bestselling author Marie Lu "You will be changed. You will be ready to rise up and reclaim your own magic!" --New York Times-bestselling author Dhonielle Clayton "The next big thing in literature and film." --Ebony "One of the biggest young adult fiction debut book deals of the year." --Teen Vogue This title has Common Core connections. #1 New York Times bestseller, March 14, 2018
Call Number: Special Collections CLC C12184ISBN: 9781250170972Publication Date: 2018-03-06
The Conjure Woman by
First published in 1899, these folk tales within a tale provide commentary on the social attitudes of the period
Call Number: Print & eBookISBN: 0472061569Publication Date: 1969-06-30
Dhalgren by
InDhalgren,perhaps one of the most profound and bestselling science fiction novels of all time, Samuel R. Delany has produced a novel "to stand with the best American fiction of the 1970s" (Jonathan Lethem). Bellona is a city at the dead center of the United States. Something has happened there…. The population has fled. Madmen and criminals wander the streets. Strange portents appear in the cloud-covered sky. And into this disaster zone comes a young man–poet, lover, and adventurer–known only as the Kid. Tackling questions of race, gender, and sexuality,Dhalgrenis a literary marvel and groundbreaking work of American magical realism.
Call Number: PS3554.E437 D48 1996ISBN: 0819562998Publication Date: 1996-07-19
Futureland by
With a keen eye toward current political trends, Walter Mosley projects a near-future United States in which justice is blind in at least one eye and the ranks of the disenfranchised have swollen to dangerous levels. The world of Futureland is delineated in nine interconnecting stories whose characters appear and reappear in each others' lives. From Ptolemy Bent, the child genius whose mercy killing of his beloved uncle and grandmother sends him to one of the world's first privatized prisons, to Fera Jones, the first female inter-gender heavyweight champion of the world, who leaves the ring for a political career, Mosley paints a clear picture of what the future could hold if our own political climate continues.
Call Number: PS3563.O88456 F88 2001ISBN: 0446610739Publication Date: 2002-11-01
How Long 'til Black Future Month? by
Three-time Hugo Award winner and NYT bestselling author N. K. Jemisin challenges and delights readers with thought-provoking narratives of destruction, rebirth, and redemption that sharply examine modern society in her first collection of short fiction, which includes never-before-seen stories. "Marvelous and wide-ranging." -- Los Angeles Times"Gorgeous" -- NPR Books"Breathtakingly imaginative and narratively bold." -- Entertainment Weekly Spirits haunt the flooded streets of New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. In a parallel universe, a utopian society watches our world, trying to learn from our mistakes. A black mother in the Jim Crow South must save her daughter from a fey offering impossible promises. And in the Hugo award-nominated short story "The City Born Great," a young street kid fights to give birth to an old metropolis's soul.
Call Number: PS3610.E46 A6 2018ISBN: 9780316491341Publication Date: 2018-11-27
John Henry Days by
In a glowing review of Colson Whitehead's first novel,The Intuitionist, theNew York Times Book Reviewconcluded, "Literary reputations may not always rise and fall as predictably as elevators, but if there's any justice in the world of fiction, Colson Whitehead's should be heading toward the upper floors." WithJohn Henry Days, Colson Whitehead delivers on the promise of his critically acclaimed debut in a magnificent new novel: a retelling of the legend of John Henry that sweeps across generations and cultures in a stunning, hilarious, and unsettling portrait of American society. Immortalized in folk ballads, John Henry has been a favorite American hero since the mid-nineteenth century. According to legend, John Henry, a black laborer for the Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad, was a man of superhuman strength and stamina. He proved his mettle in a contest with a steam drill, only to die of exhaustion moments after his triumph. InJohn Henry Days, Colson Whitehead transforms the simple ballad into a contrapuntal masterpiece. The narrative revolves around the story of J. Sutter, a young black journalist. Sutter is a "junketeer," a freeloading hack who roams from one publicity event to another, abusing his expense account and mooching as much as possible. It is 1996, and an assignment for a travel Web site takes Sutter to West Virginia for the first annual "John Henry Days" festival, a celebration of a new U.S. postal stamp honoring John Henry. And there the real story of John Henry emerges in graceful counterpoint to Sutter's thoroughly modern adventure. As he explores the parallels between the lives of these two black men, and between the Industrial Age, which literally killed John Henry, and the Digital Age that is destroying J. Sutter's soul, Whitehead adds multiple dimensions to the myth of the steel-driving man. And in dazzling set pieces, he traces the evolution of the famous ballad over the past century.John Henry Daysis a novel of extraordinary scope and mythic power that juxtaposes history and popular culture, the blatant bigotry of the past with the more insidious racism of the present, and laugh-out-loud humor with unforgettable poignancy.
Call Number: PS3573.H4768 J64 2001ISBN: 0385498195Publication Date: 2001-05-15
Midnight Robber by
A "[d]eeply satisfying" [The New York Times Book Review] story of a father who has committed an unbelievable crime and a daughter who must then fight to save her own life. "Caribbean patois adorns this novel with graceful rhythms...Beneath it lie complex, clearly evoked characters, haunting descriptions of exotic planets, and a stirring story...[This book] ought to elevate Hopkinson to star status." --Seattle Times It's Carnival time and the Caribbean-colonized planet of Toussaint is celebrating with music, dance, and pageantry. Masked "Midnight Robbers" waylay revelers with brandished weapons and spellbinding words. To young Tan-Tan, the Robber Queen is simply a favorite costume to wear at the festival--until her power-corrupted father commits an unforgiveable crime. Suddenly, both father and daughter are thrust into the brutal world of New Half-Way Tree. Here monstrous creatures from folklore are real, and the humans are violent outcasts in the wilds. Tan-Tan must reach into the heart of myth and become the Robber Queen herself. For only the Robber Queen's legendary powers can save her life . . . and set her free.
Call Number: PR9199.3.H5927 M53 2000ISBN: 0446675601Publication Date: 2000-03-01
Mumbo Jumbo by
The classic freewheeling look at race relations through the ages. Mumbo Jumbo is Ishmael Reed's brilliantly satiric deconstruction of Western civilization, a racy and uproarious commentary on our society. In it, Reed, one of our preeminent African American authors, mixes portraits of historical figures and fictional characters with sound bites on subjects ranging from ragtime to Greek philosophy. Cited by literary critic Harold Bloom as one of the five hundred most significant books in the Western canon, Mumbo Jumbo is a trenchant and often biting look at black-white relations throughout history, from a keen observer of our culture.
Call Number: PZ4.R323 MuISBN: 0684824779Publication Date: 1996-06-11
My Soul to Keep by
"An eerie epic. I loved this novel." -- Stephen King The award-winning master of horror, acclaimed author, screenwriter, and scholar Tananarive Due's classic African Immortals series starts with an electrifying piece of dark fantasy, My Soul to Keep. When Jessica marries David, he is everything she wants in a family man: brilliant, attentive, ever youthful. Yet she still feels something about him is just out of reach. Soon, as people close to Jessica begin to meet violent, mysterious deaths, David makes an unimaginable confession: More than 400 years ago, he and other members of an Ethiopian sect traded their humanity so they would never die, a secret he must protect at any cost. Now, his immortal brethren have decided David must return and leave his family in Miami. Instead, David vows to invoke a forbidden ritual to keep Jessica and his daughter with him forever. Harrowing, engrossing and skillfully rendered, My Soul to Keep traps Jessica between the desperation of immortals who want to rob her of her life and a husband who wants to rob her of her soul. With deft plotting and an unforgettable climax, this tour de force that Stephen King called 'An eerie epic' is sure to win Due a legion of new fans.
Call Number: PS3554.U3143 M9 1998ISBN: 9780061053665Publication Date: 1998-04-08
Parable of the Sower by
A New York Times Notable Book: In 2025, with the world descending into madness and anarchy, one woman begins a fateful journey toward a better future. "A stunner." --Flea, musician and actor, TheWall Street Journal Lauren Olamina and her family live in one of the only safe neighborhoods remaining on the outskirts of Los Angeles. Behind the walls of their defended enclave, Lauren's father, a preacher, and a handful of other citizens try to salvage what remains of a culture that has been destroyed by drugs, disease, war, and chronic water shortages. While her father tries to lead people on the righteous path, Lauren struggles with hyperempathy, a condition that makes her extraordinarily sensitive to the pain of others. When fire destroys their compound, Lauren's family is killed and she is forced out into a world that is fraught with danger. With a handful of other refugees, Lauren must make her way north to safety, along the way conceiving a revolutionary idea that may mean salvation for all mankind. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Octavia E. Butler including rare images from the author's estate.
Call Number: Print & eBookISBN: 9781453263617Publication Date: 2012-07-24
The Salt Eaters by
A community of Black faith healers witness an event that will change their lives forever in this "hard-nosed, wise, funny" novel (Los Angeles Times). Set in a fictional city in the American South, the novel also "inhabits the nonlinear, sacred space and sacred time of traditional African religion" (The New York Times Book Review). Though they all united in their search for the healing properties of salt, some of them are centered, some are off-balance; some are frightened, and some are daring. From the men who live off welfare women to the mud mothers who carry their children in their hides, the novel brilliantly explores the narcissistic aspect of despair and the tremendous responsibility that comes with physical, spiritual, and mental well-being.
Call Number: PS3552.A473 S2 1992ISBN: 0679740767Publication Date: 1992-06-30
Afrofuturist music emerged in the 1960s and 70s with the advent of science fiction and the space race. Contemporary musical artists continue to take inspiration from early Afrofuturist artists, along with new-age digital technologies. Afrofuturism takes many forms across music -- influencing sound, lyrics, costuming, music videos, stage design, and performance.
Watch the full-length film, Space is the Place (197), by Sun Ra on YouTube
Pioneers of Afrofuturist music: Sun Ra Arkestra; George Clinton; Earth, Wind, and Fire; LaBelle; Lee "Scratch" Perry; Jimi Hendrix
New Age Afrofuturists: Doja Cat; Lil Nas X; FKA Twigs; Solange; Willow; Janelle Monae; Jidenna; Travis Scott; Rico Nasty; Ebony Bones!; Sudan Archives; Corinne Bailey Rae; Cookiee Kawaii; Beyoncé; Nicki Minaj; Chloe x Halle; Azaelia Banks; Jojo Abot; Juan Atkins; THEEsatisfaction
Listen to these artists and more on my curated Afrofuturism playlist, Mothership Mixtape, available on Spotify or YouTube.
Visual Artists to Know: Jean-Michel Basquiat, Wangechi Mutu, Renée Cox, Ellen Gallagher, Laylah Ali, Robert Pruitt, Kaylan Michel, Cyrus Karibu
African-American Art by
African-American Art offers a current and comprehensive history that contextualizes black artists within the framework of American art as a whole. This compelling chronological survey explores issues of racial identity and representation while emphasizing aesthetics and visual analysis,helping students develop an understanding and appreciation of African-American art informed by - but not entirely defined by - racial identity.
Call Number: N6538.N5 F265 2017ISBN: 9780199995394Publication Date: 2016-02-11
Jean-Michel Basquiat by
Catalog of an exhibition held at the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, October 23, 1992-February 14, 1993; The Menil Collection, Houston, March 11-May 9, 1993; Des Moines Art Center, Iowa, May 22-August 15, 1993; and the Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts, Alabama, November 18, 1993-January 9, 1994.
Call Number: N6608.B276ISBN: 0874270812Publication Date: 1992-09-01
Modern Contemporary: art at MoMA since 1980 by
Crammed with more than 700 illustrations and peppered with thoughtful texts by a team of curators from the Museum of Modern Art, New York, this volume showcases the museum's extensive holdings of contemporary art.
Call Number: N620.M9 A72 200ISBN: 0870700219Publication Date: 2000-10-01
Wangechi Mutu by
This richly illustrated full-color catalog accompanies the first major solo museum exhibition and most comprehensive survey of the artist Wangechi Mutu's work, on view at the Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University from March 21, 2013, through July 21, 2013, before traveling to the Brooklyn Museum. Born in Nairobi, Kenya, in 1972, and now based in Brooklyn, Mutu renders the complex global sensibility of the early twenty-first century through a distinctly hybrid aesthetic. She combines found materials and magazine cutouts with sculpture and painted imagery, sampling from sources and phenomena as diverse as African traditions, international politics, the fashion industry, and science fiction. In her work, Mutu marries poetic symbolism with sociopolitical critique to explore issues of gender, race, war, colonialism, and, particularly, the exoticization of the black female body. The many images included in Wangechi Mutu: A Fantastic Journey highlight the most important and iconic works that Mutu has created since the mid-1990s, as well as portray new collages, drawings, videos, and site-specific installations. The catalog also offers an intimate look into her sketchbooks and includes an interview with the artist conducted by the exhibition's curator, Trevor Schoonmaker. Essays by Schoonmaker, the art historian Kristine Stiles, and the critic, musician, and producer Greg Tate are paired with an illustrated chronology of Mutu's work. Publication of the Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University
Call Number: N7397.6.K43ISBN: 9780938989363Publication Date: 2013-06-18
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