This collection of essays conceived of and edited by Rebecca Walker explores the ineffable state and protean aesthetics of Black Cool. From the effortless reserve of Miles Davis in khakis on an early album cover, to the shock of resistance in black women's fashion from Angela Davis to Rihanna, to the cadence of poets as diverse as Staceyann Chin and Audre Lorde, Black Cool attempts to decode the mystery of this ever-changing yet historically rooted phenomenon.
With essays by some of America's most innovative thinkers on the subject-including graphic novelist Mat Johnson, Brown University Professor of African Studies Tricia Rose, critical theorist and cultural icon bell hooks, Macarthur winner Kara Walker, and many more-Black Cool offers a periodic table of cool, wherein each writer names and defines their element of choice. Dream Hampton writes about Audacity; Helena Andrews discusses Reserve; Margo Jefferson explores Eccentricity; Veronica Chambers illuminates Genius; and so on.
With a foreword by Henry Louis Gates that bridges historical African elements of cool with the path laid out for the future, Black Cool offers a provocative perspective on this powerful cultural legacy. Rebecca Walker has contributed to the global conversation about race, gender, power, and the evolution of the human family for three decades. Since graduating from Yale, she has authored and edited seven bestselling books on subjects ranging from intergenerational feminism and multiracial identity to Black Cool and ambivalent motherhood, and written dozens of articles on topics as varied as Barack Obama's masculinity, the work of visual artist Ana Mendieta, and the changing configuration of the American family.
Walker has won many awards, including the Women Who Could Be President Award from the League of Women Voters, was named by Time magazine as one of the most influential leaders of her generation, and continues to teach her masterclass, "The Art of Memoir," at gorgeous and inspiring places around the world.
