Black History Month: On Own Voices

My second February post is fittingly about literature that celebrates Black History Month and the demise of #OwnVoices. #OwnVoices was created by author Corinne Duyvis in September 2015. The term and hashtag reflected a movement of promoting marginalized and under-recognized authors and voices. There is still much work to be done, but positive changes have been made. Two of the best two non-fiction books I have read in the past few years include How to Be An AntiRacist by Ibram X Kendi and Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You by Jason Reynolds and Ibram X Kendi. I have implemented the latter in my Grade 10 classroom. 

Excellent fiction choices include Born a Crime, The Sleeping Car Porter, Dear Martin (Dear Justyce coming out soon!), and many choices by Indigenous voices- some new. The Hate U Give has replaced To Kill a Mockingbird in schools, and rightly so, but let us not throw the baby out with the bathwater. Harper Lee’s text and Gregory Peck’s performance are worthy of attention. 

While WNDB may no longer be implementing the hashtag #Ownvoices, the movement and sentiments behind it are flourishing. We should all be reading books by Black authors, especially right now. We should be reading Latino authors, under-represented authors, Indigenous authors, Queer authors, Straight authors, and White authors. We should all be reading. Period.