Diversity and Racism

Anti-Racism and Anti-Bias Resources

Book Recommendations for Adults

* Available in the HHS library or from Sue McHugh

Waking Up White by Debby Irving *
White Fragility: Why it’s so hard for white people to talk about racism by Robin DiAngelo
So You Want to Talk about Race by Ijeoma Oluo
Stamped from the Beginning: the definitive history of racist ideas in America by Ibram X. Kendi *
An African American and Latinx History of the United States by Paul Ortiz
The Color of Success: Asian Americans and the Origin of the Model Minority by Ellen D. Wu
This Muslim-American Life: Dispatches from the War on Terror by Moustafa Bayoumi
The Hidden Rules of Race: Barriers to an Inclusive Economy by Andrea Flynn, Susuan R. Holmberg, Dorian T. Warren, and Felicia J. Wong
Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?: And Other Conversations About Race by Beverly Daniel Tatum *
Algorithms of Oppression: how search engines reinforce racism by Safiya Umoja Noble
The Half Has Never Been Told: Slavery and the making of American capitalism by Edward E. Baptist
The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness by Michelle Alexander

Additional Titles

Resources for Teaching

Zinn Education Project - history resource that focuses on stories/voices of the marginalized who are often left out of textbooks
Anti-Racist Education from Teaching Tolerance
How to be an Anti-Racist Educator
Teaching While White Podcast

Sampling of Anti-racism/Anti-bias Books in the HHS Library

This list is far from exhaustive. To find more, search the library catalog

Fiction

Historical Fiction (African-American)

The Underground Railroad, Nickel Boys and John Henry Days by Colson Whitehead
Scottsboro by Ellen Feldman
The Water Dancer by Ta-Nahesi Coates
Copper Sun by Sharon Draper
Chains by Laurie Halse Anderson
Fire from the Rock by Sharon Draper

Current Race/Ethnicity Issues

The Hate You Give by Angie Thomas
All-American Boys by Jason Reynolds
Pet by Akwaeke Emezi
Internment by Samira Ahmed
The Lines We Cross by Randa Abdel-Fattah

LGBTQ issues

Speak No Evil by Uzodinma Iweala
Almost Perfect by Brian Katcher
And She Was by Jessica Verdi
Leah on the Offbeat by Becky Albertalli
Openly Straight by Bill Konigsberg
The Stars and the Blackness Between Them by Junuada Petrus

Diverse characters (not necessarily “issue” books)

Monday’s not Coming by Tiffany Jackson
With the Fire on High by Elizabeth Acevedo (also, Poet X)
On the Come Up by Angie Thomas
Dread Nation by Justina Ireland (sci fi)
After the Shot Drops by Randy Ribay

Nonfiction

Racism/Civil Rights

When They Call You a Terrorist: a Black Lives Matters memoir by Patrisse Khan-Cullors
Port Chicago 50: disaster, mutiny and the fight for Civil Rights by Steve Sheinkin
The Rebellious Life of Mrs. Rosa Parks by Jeanne Theoharis
She Came to Slay: the life and times of Harriet Tubman by Erica Dunbar Armstrong
Was the Cat in the Hat Black? Hidden racism of children’s literature by Philip Nel
The Race Beat: the press, the Civil Rights struggle and the awakening of a nation by Gene Roberts
Hidden Figures: the American dream and the untold story of the Black women mathematicians who helped win the space race by Margot Shetterly Lee
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot
A More Beautiful and Terrible History: the uses and misuses of Civil Rights history by Jeanne Theoharis
Dark Sky Rising: Reconstruction and the Dawn of Jim Crow by Henry Louis Gates Jr.
Barracoon: the story of the last black cargo
March by John Lewis (3 books)
Between the World and Me by Ta-Nahesi Coates
Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson
Warriors Don't Cry: The Searing Memoir of the Battle to Integrate Little Rock's Central High by Melba Beals

LGBTQ

The Letter Q: queer writers’ notes to their younger selves
At the Broken Places: a mother and trans son pick up the pieces
Real Queer in America
Sissy: a coming-of-gender story
Some Assembly Required: the not-so-secret life of a transgender teen
She He They Me

Refugee/Immigrant

Displaced: Refugee Writers on Refugee Lives
Solita/Solito: Crossing Borders with youth refugees from Central America
The Newcomers: finding refuge, friendship and hope in an American Classroom by Helen Thorpe
In the Country We Love: a family divided by Diane Guerrero
Illegal: Reflections of an Undocumented Immigrant
Enchanted Air: two cultures, two wings: a memoir

Learning Differences

Autism in Heels: the untold story of female life on the spectrum
Same but different: teen life on the autism express