Black Stories Matter
"We are going back to that beautiful history and it is going to inspire us to greater achievements."
- Carter G. Woodson.
When Woodson first addressed an audience of Hampton Institute students with the signature phrase above, he was envisioning a movement far beyond building on the backs of tradition. The civil rights activist's ambitions subverted the up-and-coming "Negro Week" celebrations that would soon overwhelmingly popularize progressive high schools and extend into a concept of regeneration via revitalized history. Woodson's notion of black excellence was rooted in the plebeian- that is, he believed that history was made by the people, not simply by great men. In turn, he believed that the black community should focus on the countless black figures- past and present- who had contributed to the advancement of human civilization. At Buffalo Street Books, we share in Mr. Woodson's ideal and aim to help broaden narratives and perspectives via literary celebration. In this playlist, you will find a selection of hand-picked multi-genre highlights of black excellence to illuminate the past and inspire the present as we look toward the future.
How the Word Is Passed
A Reckoning with the History of Slavery Across America
By: Clint Smith
Narrated by: Clint Smith
Length: 10 hours 6 minutes
Audiobook details Add to Wish List“Poet Clint Smith’s personal, intimate examination of sites of historical significance to slavery is as soulful and accessible as it is urgent and important. The opening chapter on Jefferson’s Monticello is one of the best chapters of American historical writing in recent memory, and should be required reading on the legacy of America’s founders.... Read more
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A Little Devil in America
Notes in Praise of Black Performance
By: Hanif Abdurraqib
Narrated by: JD Jackson
Length: 9 hours 38 minutes
Audiobook details Add to Wish List“Using Black performance as a loose organizing principle, Abdurraqib has written a brilliant, expansive, insightful, and personal book. There is something of Montaigne’s penchant for humility and brilliance in equal measure; of Susan Sontag’s use of cultural criticism to understand history and the self; of Zadie Smith’s verbal wizardry,... Read more
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The ABCs of Black History
The ABCs of History
By: Rio Cortez
Narrated by: Bahni Turpin
Length: 55 minutes
A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER“In rhyming couplets, Cortez leads readers on a journey through Black life that acknowledges pain and struggle while building confidence with examples of triumph. It’s a tricky maneuver when writing for children, but Cortez pulls it off.” – The New York Times"A uniquely crafted ABC book that portrays some of the most... Read more
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The 1619 Project: Born on the Water
By: Nikole Hannah-Jones & Renée Watson
Narrated by: Nikole Hannah-Jones
Length: 23 minutes
The 1619 Project’s lyrical picture book in verse, adapted for audio, chronicles the consequences of slavery and the history of Black resistance in the United States, thoughtfully rendered by Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones and Newbery honor-winning author Renée Watson.
A young student receives a family tree assignment in... Read more
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The 1619 Project
A New Origin Story
By: Caitlin Roper, Ilena Silverman & Jake Silverstein
Narrated by: Nikole Hannah-Jones & Full Cast
Length: 18 hours 56 minutes
Audiobook details Add to Wish List“This book was a true education, even coming after many recent books I’ve read on race in America. It details the history of African Americans, making clear not only how central it is to the history of the United States, but how revealing it is of our national character, past and present. Chapters of historical events alternate with poetry and... Read more
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Creative Quest
By: Questlove
Narrated by: Questlove, Fred Armisen, Tariq Trotter, Dion Flynn, Robin Thede & Norm MacDonald
Length: 8 hours 44 minutes
GRAMMY NOMINEEThis unique, boundary pushing audiobook features original music by Questlove and members of The Roots with vocal guest appearances from Fred Armisen, Tariq Trotter, Dion Flynn, Robin Thede, ""Suga"" Steve Mandel, Norm MacDonald, Ludo Lefebvre, and Molly Kelly.Questlove - musician, bandleader, designer, producer, culinary... Read more
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Looking for Lorraine
The Radiant and Radical Life of Lorraine Hansberry
By: Imani Perry
Narrated by: LisaGay Hamilton
Length: 8 hours 26 minutes
Winner of the 2019 PEN/Jacqueline Bograd Weld Award for Biography
Winner of the Lambda Literary Award for LGBTQ Nonfiction
Winner of the Shilts-Grahn Triangle Award for Lesbian Nonfiction
Winner of the 2019 Phi Beta Kappa Christian Gauss Award
A New York Times Notable Book of 2018
A revealing portrait of one of the most gifted and charismatic, yet... Read more
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Kindred
By: Octavia E. Butler
Narrated by: Kim Staunton
Length: 10 hours 54 minutes
Audiobook details Add to Wish List“The novel is narrated by Dana, a Black writer is transported from 1976 back to a slave plantation in the Antebellum South, where she meets two of her ancestors: the White son of the slave owner, and a young free Black woman, who is eventually trapped, enslaved and made his concubine. Dana struggles to survive in this hostile world, and has to... Read more
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Notes of a Native Son
By: James Baldwin
Narrated by: Ron Butler
Length: 5 hours 3 minutes
At last, a new audio edition of the book many have called James Baldwin's most influential work!Written during the 1940s and early 1950s, when Baldwin was only in his twenties, the essays collected in Notes of a Native Son capture a view of black life and black thought at the dawn of the civil rights movement and as the movement slowly gained... Read more
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Black Girls Rock!
Owning Our Magic. Rocking Our Truth.
By: Beverly Bond
Narrated by: Beverly Bond
Length: 7 hours 34 minutes
From the award-winning entrepreneur, culture leader, and creator of the BLACK GIRLS ROCK! movement comes an inspiring and beautifully designed book that pays tribute to the achievements and contributions of black women around the world.
Fueled by the insights of women of diverse backgrounds, including Michelle Obama, Angela Davis, Shonda Rhimes,... Read more
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Sister Outsider
Essays and Speeches
Crossing Press Feminist
By: Audre Lorde
Narrated by: Robin Eller
Length: 7 hours 31 minutes
Presenting the essential writings of black lesbian poet and feminist writer Audre Lorde, Sister Outsider celebrates an influential voice in twentieth-century literature. In this charged collection of fifteen essays and speeches, Lorde takes on sexism, racism, ageism, homophobia, and class, and propounds social difference as a vehicle for action... Read more
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Blues People
Negro Music in White America
By: LeRoi Jones
Narrated by: Prentice Onayemi
Length: 8 hours 54 minutes
“The path the slave took to ‘citizenship’ is what I want to look at. And I make my analogy through the slave citizen’s music—through the music that is most closely associated with him: blues and a later, but parallel, development, jazz…[If] the Negro represents, or is symbolic of, something in and about the nature of American culture, this... Read more
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How Long 'til Black Future Month?
Stories
By: N. K. Jemisin
Narrated by: Shayna Small, Gail Nelson-Holgate, Robin Eller, Ron Butler, Kevin Stillwell, Je Nie Fleming & Jeanette Illidge
Length: 14 hours 10 minutes
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... Read more
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