IBRAM X. KENDI and IMANI PERRY on Racial Justice in America | 2019 Harrisburg Book Festival

On Sunday, October 6, 2019, the Harrisburg Book Festival concluded with a discussion by American University's Ibram X. Kendi, author of How To Be An Antiracist, and Princeton's Imani Perry, author of Breathe: A Memoir To My Son, at the Midtown Scholar Bookstore. Kendi and Perry were joined in conversation by University of Pittsburgh historian Keisha Blain.

Kendi and Perry offer a powerful conversation on racial justice in America, showing us how to understand and uproot racism in our society — and in ourselves. In Breathe, Perry explores the terror, grace, and beauty of coming of age as a black person in contemporary America. And in How to Be an Antiracist, Kendi asks us to think about what an antiracist society might look like, and how we can play an active role in building it. Moderated by award-winning author Keisha Blain, Kendi and Perry point us toward liberating new ways of thinking about ourselves and each other.

Signed copies of How To Be An Antiracist and Breathe are available for purchase in-store and online at the Midtown Scholar Bookstore while supplies last.

About the Books:

HOW TO BE AN ANTIRACIST

The only way to undo racism is to consistently identify and describe it—and then dismantle it.

Kendi’s concept of antiracism reenergizes and reshapes the conversation about racial justice in America—but even more fundamentally, points us toward liberating new ways of thinking about ourselves and each other. In How to Be an Antiracist, Kendi asks us to think about what an antiracist society might look like, and how we can play an active role in building it.

In this book, Kendi weaves an electrifying combination of ethics, history, law, and science, bringing it all together with an engaging personal narrative of his own awakening to antiracism. How to Be an Antiracist is an essential work for anyone who wants to go beyond an awareness of racism to the next step: contributing to the formation of a truly just and equitable society.

BREATHE: A LETTER TO MY SONS

Perry explores the terror, grace, and beauty of coming of age as a Black person in contemporary America and what it means to parent our children in a persistently unjust world.

Emotionally raw and deeply reflective, Perry issues an unflinching challenge to society to see Black children as deserving of humanity. She admits fear and frustration for her African American sons in a society that is increasingly racist and at times seems irredeemable. However, as a mother, feminist, writer, and intellectual, Perry offers an unfettered expression of love--finding beauty and possibility in life--and she exhorts her children and their peers to find the courage to chart their own paths and find steady footing and inspiration in Black tradition.

Perry draws upon the ideas of figures such as James Baldwin, W. E. B. DuBois, Emily Dickinson, Toni Morrison, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Ida B. Wells. She shares vulnerabilities and insight from her own life and from encounters in places as varied as the West Side of Chicago; Birmingham, Alabama; and New England prep schools.

With original art for the cover by Ekua Holmes, Breathe offers a broader meditation on race, gender, and the meaning of a life well lived and is also an unforgettable lesson in Black resistance and resilience.

About the Authors:

Ibram X. Kendi is a New York Times bestselling author and the founding director of the Antiracist Research and Policy Center at American University. A professor of history and international relations and a frequent public speaker, Kendi is a columnist at The Atlantic. He is the author of Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America, which won the National Book Award for Nonfiction, and The Black Campus Movement, which won the W.E.B. Du Bois Book Prize. Kendi lives in Washington, D.C.

Imani Perry is the Hughes-Rogers Professor of African American Studies at Princeton University, where she also teaches in the Programs in Law and Public Affairs, and in Gender and Sexuality Studies. She is a native of Birmingham, Alabama, and spent much of her youth in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and Chicago. She is the author of several books, including Looking for Lorraine: The Radiant and Radical Life of Lorraine Hansberry. She lives outside Philadelphia with her two sons, Freeman Diallo Perry Rabb and Issa Garner Rabb.

About the Moderator:

Keisha N. Blain is a historian who writes on race, politics, and gender. She obtained a PhD in History from Princeton University. She is an Associate Professor of History at the University of Pittsburgh and the Editor-in-Chief of The North Star. She is the author of the award-winning book Set the World on Fire: Black Nationalist Women and the Global Struggle for Freedom, and co-editor of To Turn the Whole World Over: Black Women and Internationalism; New Perspectives on the Black Intellectual Tradition; and Charleston Syllabus: Readings on Race, Racism and Racial Violence.

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