Offering an invaluable personal window and key context into the lives of her parents, Malcolm X and Dr. Betty Shabazz, Ilyasah Shabazz's memoir Growing Up X is both a singular listening experience and an important historical document. With these four selections, Shabazz shares stirring nonfiction that makes Black history come alive.
''The Autobiography of Malcolm X has remained relevant because wisdom and truth endure. My father’s life and reflections continue to guide generations of people globally, as we work to build a world in which we get to be our most whole selves.''
''In so many ways the Black Lives Matter movement has been influenced by Malcolm X’s vision and teachings. It is important that we all understand the genesis of this generation’s civil rights movement, and that we honor the Black women who have carried the torch forward.''
''W.E.B. DuBois was one of the founders of modern-day sociology and also of the NAACP. He pioneered how we think about race in this country, and gave words to the complex experience of double consciousness, which represents at once being an American in a white-dominated society, and also a Black person seeking physical and spiritual emancipation.''
''Toni Morrison was a once-in-a-generation wordsmith, whose understanding of social movements benefited us all. This anthology of Morrison’s brilliant work is a must-hear, and a reminder in her own words ‘to lessen suffering, to know the truth and tell it, to raise the bar of humane expectation’.''
