Additional Information on Reading/Race

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Summer 2020: A young reader in the Boogie Down Books community shares their school's summer reading list for grades 6-12 (pictured above). Protesters in cities across the world are demanding an end to state-sanctioned police violence against Black Americans, and Covid-19 has laid bare myriad racial inequities across our society, from health outcomes to education. Nevertheless, this school has not made any updates to its required summer reading. Once again students are required to read books entirely by white people written at least half a century ago, almost certainly too challenging for them to read independently at the assigned grade level to truly make deep meaning from without the support of a teacher or structured collaboration with classmates.

Here at Boogie Down Books, we try to assume the most generous explanation for this summer reading list that we can possibly imagine: that the educators behind it don't know about all of the other truly amazing books that their students would probably find much, much more enjoyable, relevant, and accessible. And as educators, we know that when someone doesn't know something, there's no other way forward than to help them learn.

We start thinking about all of the well-meaning educators out there who might not have the time or the resources to learn about all of the extraordinary books for young people that have been published more recently (i.e. this millennium).  We could’ve stopped with just producing a recommended reading list, but we had already shared two lists for families and educators, and we knew that recommending books did not ensure that those books would actually get into students' hands and prompt conversations about race in American classrooms. Our core values as a business are joy, justice, and community, and we knew we needed to do more than publish lists in order to stay true to those values. So we start envisioning a reading community for educators to collaboratively explore contemporary young adult literature and nonfiction that centers the voices, hi(stories), and experiences of Black, Indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC). The result: Reading/Race, our new ten-month virtual reading series.

We find it hard to imagine conversations about texts in American classrooms that can't or shouldn't be connected–directly or indirectly–to race, but because whiteness is traditionally regarded as simply the norm rather than a distinct race, race is rarely foregrounded in discussions about white-centered texts. For example, do most students talk about race when they read The Catcher in the Rye? Or The Bell Jar? Or any of the other texts on that summer reading list? Not in our experience.

In contrast, the selected texts for Reading/Race invite multifaceted conversations about the rich and complex experiences of young people in this country. These books acknowledge and center the complex racial identities of the young people they’re about through depictions of celebration, jubilation, ancestry, and community, as well as discrimination and struggle. To read is  to comprehend, interpret, discover, discern, understand, inspect, and study. That's what we're doing in this series.

To create this reading list, we pored through everything we've read over the past decade and gathered feedback from other antiracist educators. The eleven books we'll be discussing in Reading/Race are all written by and about members of BIPOC communities and for young adult readers, generally ages 12+. These books speak to young people's lives and to what is happening in the world around them right now while also celebrating their resilience, their ingenuity, and their potential. Featured genres include history, memoir, comics, short stories, realistic fiction, science fiction, and romance. Five of the titles feature major characters who identify as LGBTQ+. And with one exception, they were all published within the last two years. (The senior citizen of the group was published way back in 2012.)

The series begins with This Book is Anti-Racist: 20 Lessons on How to Wake Up, Take Action, and Do the Work by Tiffany Jewell and Aurelia Durand (nonfiction, 2020), a beautifully designed book that succinctly explores identity, defines terms, and provides practical advice for readers of all ages. If you attend only one session in Reading/Race, let it be our September 17 discussion of this book. It's a must-read.

We wanted to include Fresh Ink, edited by Lamar Giles (short fiction, 2018), early in the series because we know that many teachers start the school year with short stories, and this year doing so might be even more helpful for students reactivating their reading habits after a long break. But these are not the short stories of yore (we love "The Lottery" too but COME ON). As promised by the title, these short stories–plus a short graphic novel and a one-act play–by a range of authors provide fresh, contemporary, relevant takes on an old form.

The vital historical narratives and analysis articulated in An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States for Young People by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, Jean Mendoza, and Debbie Reese (nonfiction, 2019) and Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You: A Remix of the National Book Award-winning Stamped from the Beginning by Jason Reynolds and Ibram X. Kendi (nonfiction, 2020) serve as correctives to the content and format of corporately-produced history textbooks traditionally used in high school social studies classes. Both books provide historical frameworks to enrich our understandings of the fictional works we'll subsequently read.

March: Book 1 by John Lewis, Andrew Aydin, & Nate Powell (graphic novel/memoir, 2013) and Victor LaValle’s Destroyer by Victor LaValle & Dietrich Smith (comic/science fiction, 2018) provide complementary examples of the power of comic books to illuminate complex themes and narratives and to inspire readers. Author, politician, and civil rights icon John Lewis was himself inspired by the 1957 comic book Martin Luther King and the Montgomery Story. 

Nearly half of the Reading/Race selected texts are compelling YA novels that explore the realities of adolescence in varied communities and cultures across the United States. These books depict teenagers successfully dealing with a wide spectrum of realistic milestones and challenges, including romantic relationships, coming out, death, family secrets, changing friendships, family incarceration, interracial dating, parental pressure, academic stress, and the college application process, as well as bullying, colorism, cultural genocide, ethnic stereotypes, and sexual assault. These books are joyful, heartbreaking, inspiring, and always illuminating. We dare you not to fall in love with each and every one of them:

• Hearts Unbroken by Cynthia Leitich Smith (fiction, 2018)
• You Should See Me in a Crown by Leah Johnson (fiction, 2020)
• Clap When You Land by Elizabeth Acevedo (fiction, 2020)
• Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe by Benjamin Alire Sáenz (fiction, 2012)
• Frankly in Love by David Yoon (fiction, 2019)

Our facilitation team is comprised of veteran educators with extensive expertise in leading text-based discussions with adolescents and supporting adult learning. Come learn with them!