Synopses & Reviews
Du Bois' 1903 collection of essays is a thoughtful, articulate exploration of the moral and intellectual issues surrounding the perception of blacks within American society.
Synopsis
Du Bois' 1903 collection of essays is a thoughtful, articulate exploration of the moral and intellectual issues surrounding the perception of blacks within American society.
For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
Synopsis
The landmark book about being black in America, now in an expanded edition commemorating the 150th anniversary of W. E. B. Du Bois's birth and featuring a new introduction by Ibram X. Kendi, the National Book Award-winning author of Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America "The problem of the Twentieth Century is the problem of the color-line."
When
The Souls of Black Folk was first published in 1903, it had a galvanizing effect on the conversation about race in America--and it remains both a touchstone in the literature of African America and a beacon in the fight for civil rights. Believing that one can know the "soul" of a race by knowing the souls of individuals, W. E. B. Du Bois combines history and stirring autobiography to reflect on the magnitude of American racism and to chart a path forward against oppression, and introduces the now-famous concepts of the color line, the veil, and double-consciousness.
This edition of Du Bois's visionary masterpiece includes two additional essays that have become essential reading: "The Souls of White Folk," from his 1920 book Darkwater, and "The Talented Tenth."
For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,800 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
Synopsis
When The Souls of Black Folk was first published in 1903, it had a galvanizing effect on the conversation about race in America - and it remains both a touchstone in the literature of African America and a beacon in the fight for civil rights. W. E. B. Du Bois combines history and stirring autobiography to reflect on the magnitude of American racism and to chart a path forward against oppression.
About the Author
William Edward Burghardt Du Bois was born in 1868 in Great Barrington, Massachusetts. A brilliant student and natural leader, he experienced little prejudice during his early years; it was while attending Fisk, a Southern university for Negroes, that the young Du Bois first fully awoke to the realities of race in America. His response was to make the cause of the black people his own. After graduation from Fisk, he earned his Ph.D. from Harvard, studied in Berlin, and become one of the great pioneer sociologists. In 1903, The Souls of Black Folk appeared. This prophetic masterpiece was but the beginning of a long, often lonely crusade that saw Du Bois forced into an increasingly radical position in his search for a solution to the American racial dilemma. His final years were marked by disillusionment with his native land, renunciation of his citizenship, and final self-exile in Ghana, where he died in 1963 at the age of ninety-five.
Table of Contents
Introduction by Donald B. Gibson
Acknowledgments
Suggestions for Further Reading
THE SOULS OF BLACK FOLK
The Forethought
I. Of Our Spiritual Strivings
II. Of the Dawn of Freedom
III. Of Mr. Booker T. Washington and Others
IV. Of the Meaning of Progress
V. Of the Wings of Atalanta
VI. Of the Training of Black Men
VII. Of the Black Belt
VIII. Of the Quest of the Golden Fleece
IX. Of the Sons of Master and Man
X. Of the Faith of the Fathers
XI. Of the Passing of the First-Born
XII. Of Alexander Crummell
XIII. Of the Coming of John
XIV. Of the Sorrow Songs
The Afterthought
Notes by Monica M. Elbert
Ibram X. Kendi on PowellsBooks.Blog
Following up my National Book Award–winning
Stamped From the Beginning, I sought to create an original approach to understanding and uprooting racism and inequality in our society — and in ourselves...
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