The first enslaved Africans were brought to the U.S. in 1619. It is well-documented that before the Civil War in 1865 the education of Black Americans was illegal.  In 1896, the Supreme Court decision of Plessy vs. Ferguson established separate public schools for black and white students. Even after it became legal, the battle for equitable education was still fought in 1954 in Brown vs. Board of Education. 

I remember being in elementary school and looking at the books in the library and seeing lots of books about white boys and their dogs. If it wasn’t that then it was something by James Patterson. When I got into middle school the most popular books were R. L. Stein’s Goosebumps and Babysitters Club and although I’m familiar with the old adage “Don’t judge a book by its cover” it was plain to see that those books were not written with me in mind. White men more than dominated the world of literature for decades. Black women writers were virtually ignored.  I think the first book that I read by a Black woman was Mildred D. Taylor’s Rolling Thunder Hear My Cry. Towards the end of middle school somehow I got my hands on a copy of Alice Walker’s “Color Purple”. It was the first time I read something and saw myself, my aunt, and the women in my neighborhood. That book and so many other books written by Black women literally changed my life.  I would later learn that there was a plethora of Black women authors whose literature was not explored in popular discourse or education. After discovering more Black women authors I became a voracious reader. In high school I read all of Terry McMillian, Zane. When I got to college I began reading everything Toni Morrison wrote. I read more of Alice Walker, Nikki Giovanni, Octavia Butler, Melissa Harris-Perry. The list is entirely too long to put all the names here. I would literally go in my room and read for days on end. Several books only took me a weekend to read through. They were sooooooo good. Lately I’ve been re-reading Brittney Cooper and Adrian Marie Brown, bell hooks and various other Black women authors whose work isn’t  as widely circulated as the aforementioned authors. Black women continue to write. They write fiction, science fiction, non- fiction, articles, academic journals, critiques, essays, blogs, medical journals, short stories, dissertations, poetry, songs and as long as they are writing I’ll be reading. ey component for self-love, balancing multiple roles and managing emotions.