ARC provided by Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.
Sadly I wasn't able to read The Black Intellectual Tradition in time to give it a proper review.

A lovely collection of Black thinkers / scholars / pundits, etc. Would love to have a physical copy to put on my bookshelf.

This book is a survey of the history of Black scholarship. It includes chapters on; Black feminism, womanism and conservatism. It explores; memoir, identity, Afrocentrism, Black fraternities, pan- Africanism. It is an accessible, scholarly, work. Like many essay collections, the standard varies between the different essays. However, all essays had interesting points. It is well worth a read.

“The Black Intellectual Tradition” is a collection of fascinating essays which “concentrate on the ideas that Black artists and intellectuals, performers and protest activists, institutions and organizations, and educators and religious leaders developed to fight against the persistent waves of racial oppression sweeping over generations of Black people in the United States. Indeed, these ideas animate the long struggle of Black people for equal justice.” They aren’t light or easy reads but rather in-depth and thought-provoking. They cover history as well as reflecting on the current day, post-Trump.

I found the reflections the impact of music, art and the Greek-lettered organisations especially interesting. The essay on Obama was insightful and articulates well the mix of emotions, politics and challenges experienced during his presidency. This isn’t a book in which you will agree with everything, it is written to challenge and cover the full spectrum of opinion and it does that!

At times, I found the writing style of a contributor heavy or overburdened with descriptors but, on balance, I thoroughly enjoyed it. It is a four out of five on the enJOYment and, if this is something you’d like to expand your knowledge on, I highly recommend it.

I received a complimentary copy of the book from the University of Illinois Press through NetGalley. The opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

The Black Intellectual Tradition is a robust collection of Black research and thought, suitable for both new students as well as those more seasoned. The editors sought out to simultaneously provide documentation of there being a Black intellectual tradition in the US but also to showcase its breadth and depth and researchers from a variety of disciplines will find value in this collection.

The collection is equally divided into four categories: scholarship & education, arts & letters, social activism & institutions, and lastly identity & ideology and while the introduction suffers from a tad too much historiographical content, the core of the essays are worthwhile. As a cultural historian, I naturally gravitated more to the Arts & Letters section, with Venetria K Patton's essay on contemporary slavery novels being a highlight of the text.

Highly recommend this collection for academics in the humanities and those specifically interested in Black intellectualism.

The Black Intellectual Tradition is a collection of academic essays examining race in America. This is a really comprehensive examination and one I will go back to. It's well researched and thorough in its examinations, and offers a range of perspectives from great thinkers of the 20th century. This is an essential read and one that I highly recommend, and will be recommending. often.

An interesting and thorough collection of academic essays covering the breadth of "black" thought in America during the 20th century. This book is an invaluable resource not just for the insightful essays, which do a great job contextualizing the featured thinkers and lines of thought within the larger intellectual landscape, but also for introducing the reader to new thinkers and reading lists. This book is a worthy addition to any academic library.

What a refreshing collection of writings! I was nervous while accepting this book. It almost seems futile to talk about race anymore, given our present socio-political situation. Racism exists! There’s simply no denying that. To open up a dialog, however, is near impossible without being either:
a) immediately gaslit by patent - generally conservative - bigots; or else…
b) paradoxically preempted as unobjective, owing to the conspicuous porcelain hue of my skin and azure eyes betraying my Scandinavian heritage.

That said, no, I don’t wish to split the difference! The insanity seen on both sides in no way menaces my proposition that we MUST travel further left on matters of discrimination. While most of the heavy lifting achieved in terms of structurally dismantling systemic oppression of the African diaspora in the U.S. - namely, starting from the time of Reconstruction through to the Civil Rights era - is heartening, there's still much work to be done socially. The Black Intellectual Tradition plots this course faithfully.

We can talk about race with dignity and intellectual rigour. It is possible, for instance, to defend racial justice AND condemn the historic overtures and hypocrisy of Black Power/Internationalism. It's also possible to support the goals of Black Lives Matter, while calling out violence and the patriarchal sabotaging of its Womanist origins. We can conduct Afrocentric historiography with integrity, or decry class disparity in Black suburbs, without dealing in the grotesque and scandalous smear of 'Black inferiority' advanced by the obscurantist Thomas Sowell, the self-hating Star Parker, and now, the preeminent Trumpian ideologue Candace Owens.

There is a history that is aching to be read. Speaking about race need not degenerate into name-calling Blacks, "professional victims!" and Whites, "hopeless racists!" based solely on the pigmentation of each other’s skin. Will you read this history, though? That’s the question.

My favourite works herein are:
Chapter 3 by J. Coleman, describing the world of Advocacy Aesthetics, and its success in ‘speaking truth to power’.
Chapter 6 by L. Maparyan, which differentiates Womanism from materialist Eurocentric Feminism, exposes Western moral self-righteousness, and highlights the oft-underrated richness of Africanity.
Chapter 12 by Z. Miletsky, assessing the prospect of racial harmony in a post-Obama/Trump America (Postracialism is likely too optimistic a project, albeit worthwhile).

4.5 out of 5 stars. Thank you for the advanced copy. I loved it!

My thanks to NetGalley.com for a copy of this collection of academic essays prior to its publication. I have already recommended this collection to my college's institution for purchase. Although this book will likely be of most interest to scholars and students working within African American Studies programs, it should be read by anyone who wants to deepen their reading around anti-racism, educational theory or history. Like many other white readers, I've tried to diversify my reading list over the last few years, but this has been the first book I've read that challenged me to consider a broader intellectual tradition in the United States. Now I have a much broader and more scholarly set of texts that I know I need to read.

The editors preface each section with helpful notes that contextualize each contribution. The book has four sections with between two and four essays in each section: scholarship and education, ants and letters, social activism and institutions, and identity and ideology. The chapters on neo-slave narrative and black women's memoirs were most interesting to me. but I am coming to the book from an English studies perspective.

This book is an important read in today’s America. While some of the contributors and ideas were familiar to me from other reading I have done, this volume broadened my horizons. This is worthy and important. Pick it up.

I love this becuase it takes us back to the 1900s; from experiences, hopes and realities of black people in America and the essays are informative as they are surprising because there is so much on black people that's not shared or well known.
This collection however needs time. It is not the kind of book to read leisurely or in one sitting and expect to say whether you like it or not; it's one you learn from and question most of the stories you've been told over the years and I feel that most people in America could do well to read it.
Thanks Netgalley for the eARC.