Image: Kwame Ture/Stokely Carmichael playing with a child, during the Meredith March where he famously called for Black Power.

Resources

• The Black Joy Parade.
• The Black Joy Project.
• The Museum of Black Joy.
• Adreinne Waheed: Black Joy & Resistance photos.

Books

Valerie Boyd (editor): Bigger Than Bravery: Black Resilience and Reclamation in a Time of Pandemic.

Tracey Michae’l Lewis-Giggetts: Black Joy: Stories of Resistance, Resilience, and Restoration.

Lindsey Stewart: The Politics of Black Joy: Zora Neale Hurston and Neo-Abolitionism.

Adreinne Waheed: Black Joy and Resistance.

See here and here for lists of books that celebrate Black joy.

Articles

Getting started: check out the suggested articles at the Black Joy Project, then continue here!

ACLU: Three Artists Explain & Visualize What Black Joy Means to Them.

Veronica Chambers:Toni Morrison Dancing: Photos of the Author at Work and Play: Irresistible vitality and intensity were cornerstones of her extraordinary life.

Ayesha Hardison & Randal Maurice Jelks: Zora Neale Hurston’s Radical Black Love.

Joyann Jeffrey: 10 exceptional people who are using Black joy as a form of resistance: Black joy is about “manifesting the joy that you need, deserve, or desire,” says Kleaver Cruz of The Black Joy Project.

Rachel Jones: What is Black joy? See it through the eyes of these groundbreaking artists. Black creators chronicle the experiences that nourish their communities.

Chanté Joseph: What Black Joy Means – And Why It’s More Important Than Ever: Where society has told Black people to “be quiet”, or that we’re “too loud”, revelling in joy is an act of resistance. As our feeds become even more inundated with images of trauma, joy can help us heal.

Tracey Michae’l Lewis-Giggetts:

• Black Joy Is About Resistance, Resilience, and Restoration. (Interview).
• Black Joy in Pursuit of Racial Justice: What does it mean to give ourselves permission to experience joy even when grief and rage are present?

Brence Pernell: The right to joy and pleasure is a crucial element of racial justice: Addressing systemic racism and state violence is not enough.

Neda Ulaby: At The ‘Museum Of Black Joy,’ It’s The Everyday Moments That Go On Display.

Images of Black Joy in U.S. History

James Baldwin, with CORE member Doris Jean Castle in New Orleans. Photo by movement photographer Steve Schapiro.

Toni Morrison at a disco party.

Fannie Lou Hamer, with her husband Pap.

Kwame Ture/Stokely Carmichael playing with a child, during the Meredith March where he famously called for Black Power.

Martin and Coretta…

Bernice King (follow at @BerniceKing) paying homage to a classic photo of her father.

Toni Morrison, June Jordan, Audrey Edwards, Alice Walker, Nana Maynard, Ntzoke Shange, and Vertamae Grosvenor at the first meeting of their writing group, “The Sisterhood.” (part of June Jordan Papers, Harvard Schlesinger Library). Bessie Smith’s photo is hanging on the wall.

Amiri Baraka and Maya Angelou dancing, Photo by Chester Higgins, Jr.: “At the conclusion of the program, filled with poetry readings and accolades for Langston Hughes, a jazz combo livened the tempo. As I watched, Amiri Baraka asked Maya Angelou to dance and walked her to the “I’ve Known Rivers” Cosmogram — the focal point of the celebration, newly set into the floor over the ashes of Langston Hughes. As the two poets danced, the energy of the crowd focused on them. The room came alive…”

Belafonte & King…

Malcolm