we refuse to be silent: women’s voices on justice for black men

The women have something to say. Are you listening?

In this powerful and needed collection, editor Angela P. Dodson brings together the voices of more than thirty-five accomplished women writers on the topic of violence and injustice against Black men. These writers are journalists, authors, scholars, ministers, psychologists, counselors, and other experts. They are also wives, mothers, sisters, daughters, aunties, and friends. Each lends her voice to shine a new light on the injustices and dangers Black men face daily, and how women feel about the vulnerability of our sons, husbands, brothers, fathers, uncles, friends, and other males we care about as they navigate a world that often stereotypes and targets them. Contributors include:

-Elizabeth Alexander, president of the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, poet, and author of The Light of the World

-Brenda M. Greene, founder and executive director of the Center for Black Literature, director of the National Black Writers Conference, and professor of English at Medgar Evers College of the City University of New York

-Goldie Taylor, former US Marine, MSNBC contributor, author, and an editor at large of The Daily Beast

-Isabel Wilkerson, Pulitzer Prize winner, National Humanities Medal recipient, and author of Caste and The Warmth of Other Suns

-Charisse Jones, award-winning journalist and coauthor of eight books, including Shifting: The Double Lives of Black Women in America and the New York Times bestselling memoir of Misty Copeland, Life in Motion: An Unlikely Ballerina

-Audrey Edwards, former executive editor of Essence magazine and the author of seven books, including the award-winning American Runaway: Black and Free in Paris in the Trump Years

-Michelle Duster, author, public historian, and great-granddaughter of Ida B. Wells

-Sonya Ross, managing editor of Inside Climate News, founder of Black Women Unmuted, AP’s first Black woman White House reporter, and first Black woman elected to the board of the White House Correspondents Association

-Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, contributing writer at The New Yorker, Leon Forrest Professor of African American Studies at Northwestern University, author of Race for Profit, and editor of How We Get Free

-Donna Brazile, endowed chair of the Gwendolyn and Colbert King public policy lecture series at Howard University, member of USA Today’s Board of Contributors, Fox News contributor, and author of Hacks: The Inside Story of the Break-ins and Breakdowns That Put Donald Trump in the White House

-Darnella Frazier, citizen journalist awarded a Pulitzer citation for her role filming the murder of George Floyd

The catalyst for a national conversation, this collection offers historical context that is often missing from public discussions and media coverage, while demonstrating an ongoing pattern of demonizing Black men that is rooted deep in the history of our nation. The essays in this book engage with the emotional toll anti-Black violence takes on women in particular and cast a vision for future activism.