SING A BLACK GIRL'S SONG: An Evening Celebrating NTOZAKE SHANGE with DR. YABA BLAY, TARANA BURKE, & IMANI PERRY
A Room of One's Own is thrilled to join the Wisconsin Book Festival in welcoming Dr. Yaba Blay, Tarana J. Burke, and Imani Perry to celebrate the newly released posthumous collection of Ntozake Shange's work: Sing a Black Girl's Song: The Unpublished Work of Ntozake Shange
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About the Book
Sing a Black Girl’s Song, is a new posthumous collection of Shange’s unpublished poems, essays, and plays from throughout the life of the seminal Black feminist writer. https://www.crowdcast.io/c/wbf-sing-a-black-girls-song .
This seminal collection is a window into Shange’s internal life, from her writings as a budding poet and her galvanizing calls to action written during the Black Arts Movement to her verse and prose are infused with humor, sadness, joy, and projections of a better future — exemplifying not only the breadth of Black experience in America, but of the human experience as a whole. Throughout, she references the people, languages, places, music, and groups that influenced and enriched her work. Where the world often forces Black women into isolation due to systematic injustice, Shange, in her undeniably singular voice, firmly rebuked the idea that we are meant to suffer alone, or at all. For every Black woman and girl drowning in feelings of self-doubt, lovelessness, and victimhood, Shange used her prose to provide love and healing.
Ntozake Shange, author of 36 published works, is increasingly recognized as one of America’s greatest writers having, for 50 years, embodied the struggle of women of color for equality and the recognition of their contribution to human culture. Shange’s literary legacy, preserved in the Shange Institute at Barnard College, comprises 13 plays, seven novels, six children’s books, and 19 poetry collections, the majority of which are published and in print.
Dr. Yaba Blay works in service of Black liberation every day. A scholar-activist, cultural worker, and occasional writer, her practice centers Black global experiences, particularly those of Black women and girls. Her research and scholarship engage the Black body, with a particular focus on colorism and skin color politics.
Tarana J. Burke (Foreword), for more than 25 years as activist, advocate, and author, has worked at the intersection of sexual violence and racial justice. Fueled by commitments to interrupt sexual violence and other systemic inequalities disproportionately impacting marginalized people, particularly Black women and girls, Tarana has created and led various campaigns focused on increasing access to resources and support for impacted communities, including the ‘me too.’ Movement, which has galvanized millions of survivors and allies around the world.
Imani Perry (Editor) is the Carol K. Pforzheimer professor at Harvard Radcliffe Institute and professor of African American studies and women and gender studies at Harvard University. She is the author of seven books, including South to America, winner of the 2022 National Book Award. She is a recipient of the Lambda Literary Award and the Hurston Wright Award, and was a finalist for an NAACP Image Award, among others.
