Overview
A lyrical meditation on how Black Americans have envisioned utopiaāand sought to transform their lives.
How do the disillusioned, the forgotten, and the persecuted not merely hold on to life but expand its possibilities and preserve its beauty? What, in other words, does utopia look like in black?
These questions animate Aaron Robertsonās exploration of Black Americans' efforts to remake the conditions of their lives. Writing in the tradition of Saidiya Hartman and Ta-Nehisi Coates, Robertson makes his way from his ancestral hometown of Promise Land, Tennessee, to Detroitāthe city where he was born, and where one of the countryās most remarkable Black utopian experiments got its start. Founded by the brilliant preacher Albert Cleage Jr., the Shrine of the Black Madonna combined Afrocentric Christian practice with radical social projects to transform the self-conception of its members. Central to this endeavor was the Shrineās chancel mural of a Black Virgin and child, the icon of a nationwide liberation movement that would come to be known as Black Christian Nationalism. The Shrineās members opened bookstores and co-ops, created a self-defense force, and raised their children communally, eventually working to establish the countryās largest Black-owned farm, where attempts to create an earthly paradise for Black people continues today.
Alongside the Shrineās story, Robertson reflects on a diverse array of Black utopian visions, from the Reconstruction era through the countercultural fervor of the 1960s and 1970s and into the present day. By doing so, Robertson showcases the enduring quest of collectives and individuals for a world beyond the constraints of systemic racism.
The Black Utopians offers a nuanced portrait of the struggle for spacesāboth ideological and physicalāwhere Black dignity, protection, and nourishment are paramount. This book is the story of a movement and of a world still in the makingāone that points the way toward radical alternatives for the future.
This book title, The Black Utopians (Searching for Paradise and the Promised Land in America), ISBN: 9780374604981, by Aaron Robertson, published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux (October 1, 2024) is available in hardcover. Our minimum order quantity is 25 copies. All standard bulk book orders ship FREE in the continental USA and delivered in 4-10 business days.
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