Discourse in Black: Voices of the Self, Let’s Flip the Script, and Liberation Memories

Three groundbreaking texts on Black rhetoric by a renowned and award-winning scholar.

Explore the influential prose of Keith Gilyard in this impressive collection, bringing together three seminal works that challenge and expand our understanding of language, education, and cultural identity. Voices of the Self--a winner of the American Book Award--explores the impact of African American Vernacular English (AAVE) on education, advocating for linguistic pluralism. Let’s Flip the Script continues this dialogue with a series of provocative essays on language politics, education, and the dynamics of varied teaching methodologies. Gilyard’s insights into the treatment and history of AAVE and his reflections on language as a transformative tool in life and literature are especially timely in today’s diverse educational landscape. In Liberation Memories, he shifts focus to the intersection of rhetoric and poetics in African American literature, highlighting the works of John Oliver Killens and their relevance to contemporary discussions on cultural expression and social justice. Through all three of the essential works in this compendium, Gilyard has nourished American literary and rhetorical discourse with a reframing of topics and conversations spanning language, culture, and educational praxis.

Keith Gilyard is the Edwin Erle Sparks Professor of English and African American Studies at the Pennsylvania State University and a former president of the National Council of Teachers of English. He has published widely on topics of language and rhetoric in both fiction and nonfiction genres and is the recipient of two American Book Awards and the Penn State Faculty Scholar Medal for Outstanding Achievement in the Arts and Humanities.