So I’m really really excited for the next Free Black Women’s Library session happening at Studio Museum in Harlem today. This is a traveling biblio-installation of books written by Black women that I started collecting in 2015 and now have 850 books total.
All are welcome to stop by to check out and enjoy the collection as well as trade books with the library.
Please remember to bring only books written by Black women for trading.
Know that you do not need to bring books to attend or enjoy 😊
The library will be open from noon to 5 and I’m leading a short story telling session/workshop at 2.
I will be reading “Girl” by Jamaica Kincaid and “Sweat” by Zora Neale Hurston ✨✨
There is also some gorgeous art currently in the museum so I highly recommend checking out their current exhibits as well, all in all it’s going to be a pretty awesome day, so come through!!
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#books #booklover #bibliophile #installation #goodreads #museum #harlem #blackbooks #mobilelibrary #blackwriters #studiomuseum #blackwomanbibliophile #freeblackwomenslibraryMore you might like
The Free Black Women’s Library is an interactive biblio-installation that currently features over 900 books of varying genres written by Black women as well as visual art, film screenings, workshops, readings, book talk and critical conversations. The purpose/mission of the library is to center and celebrate the words, stories and lives of Black women from all over the world. The library pops up monthly and mainly in Brooklyn but has also been to Philadelphia, Detroit, Baltimore and Chicago.
To support the library feel free to send your favorite books by Black women to 1072 Bedford ave, box 39, Brooklyn, NY. To make a financial contribution which goes toward transportation and administrative costs as well as future website and app, you can make a donation to the crowdrise page. Thank you!!
@kiyannaloves got two of my faves last Sunday at The Free Black Women’s Library!! Major score, yay!!😍😍
#books #bookstagram #bookswap #goodreads #blackbooks #BlackBookwormsMatter #blackwomanbibliophile #freeblackwomenslibrary 📚📚📚📚📚📚📚📚📚
#Repost @kiyannaloves (@get_repost)
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So excited about these two books I got at @thefreeblackwomenslibrary session today at the Studio Museum in Harlem! There were so many great books and awesome people 📖✨
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Here are some of the books I have for tweens and young teens including two of my favorites, Ninth Ward and One Crazy Summer 💕💕
I am really excited to have books for this age group, they deserve special attention and mindful representation. Reading is a lot more fun for kids (and adults too I think) when you can relate to the characters.
Thank you much to CiCi Adams for writing this gorgeous thoughtful piece on The Free Black Women’s Library for O, The Oprah Magazine!!
“Some periods of our growth are so confusing that we don’t even recognize that growth is happening. We may feel hostile or angry or weepy and hysterical, or we may feel depressed. It would never occur to us, unless we stumbled on a book or a person who explained to us, that we were in fact in the process of change, of actually becoming larger, spiritually, than we were before. Whenever we grow, we tend to feel it, as a young seed must feel the weight and inertia of the earth as it seeks to break out of its shell on its way to becoming a plant. Often the feeling is anything but pleasant. But what is most unpleasant is the not knowing what is happening. Those long periods when something inside ourselves seems to be waiting, holding its breath, unsure about what the next step should be, eventually become the periods we wait for, for it is in those periods that we realize that we are being prepared for the next phase of our life and that, in all probability, a new level of the personality is about to be revealed.” - Alice Walker/Living by the Word
Blessed Equinox Beloveds, now is a time of transition and deep learning, touched with sadness and confusion. These words of Alice Walker are like a balm to my soul. As Spring approaches, many of us are feeling an alignment to nature’s cycle, shedding and releasing shells and skins, bursting and blooming into something fresh and new. I am feeling both overwhelmed and excited by the changes. Currently in my last semester of an MFA program, working on my final portfolio project and investigating the legacy of radical Black librarianship. I am both in awe and inspired by women like Jewele Mazique, Mayme Agnew Clayton, and of course audre lorde. There is a long standing tradition in our community of finding liberation, healing, empowerment, community and joy through our words and stories, and the folks who take time to archive and provide access to them are my role models and inspiration.
Want to wish you a powerful and love filled Spring season as well as invite you to the next Free Black Women’s Library session.
We are back at cozy Bailey’s Cafe located in Bedford Stuyvesant, Brooklyn, 324 Malcolm X Boulevard. Its Happening on Sunday, March 25th from 2pm to 7pm.
We are discussing the mind-blowing debut novel from Akwaeke Emezi entitled Freshwater.
This is a gorgeous and deep read, that explores the metaphysics of identity and being, the layers of mind, body and spirit. It is a heavy and powerful story that caused a psychic shift in me upon reading. It’s now on my list of favorites.
All are welcome to take part in the conversation about the book and its characters, the conversation starts at 4pm.
(please keep in mind the book contains scenarios of physical trauma, suicidal ideation and sexual assault so most likely these topics will be discussed)
Also feel free to save the date for our April edition of the library which is happening on Sunday, April 29th from 1pm to 6pm at Ancient Song Studio, located at 521 Halsey Street, Brooklyn.
We are discussing, When They Call You A Terrorist, A Black Lives Matter Memoir, the amazing memoir by Patrisse Khan Cullors and asha bandele.
This book is an amazing testimony, a brave and precious offering and reflection on Black womanhood, state violence, the criminalization of poverty, mental health disparities, relationship accountability, vulnerability and the power of community. This book taught me the same way Assata’s memoir taught me about Black Feminism, community organizing and I am so grateful for its existence I look forward to talking about it with you next month.
This conversation is open to all, reading the book before attending is highly recommended.
** I have consumed 8 books this year, and these are my two favorites so far!!
My next read Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi, is a YA fantasy novel that melds contemporary issue with West African mythology, its generated quite a buzz and I’m looking forward to diving in.
Please feel free to drop me a message letting me know what you are reading these days, as I would love to know!!
Thanks for all the sweet support via kind messages, book donations and financial contributions!!
and let’s continue to stay connected through social media, Instagram, Facebook & Tumblr…..
Here’s to blooming in love, language and creativity!!
and my sincerest apologies if you are getting this message twice!!
Peace!!
The Free Black Women’s Library is officially installed and open, as part of the nerdy quirky pretty exhibit CURRICULUM : SPACES FOR LEARNING & UNLEARNING at
EFA Project Space
323 West 39th street
2nd floor
NYC, NY
Now until March 16. ⭐️📚
You are welcome to visit and trade books written by Black women with the library, watch the original version of Ntozake Shange’s iconic play FOR COLORED GIRLS on the monitor, read, write, draw, play, sleep, dance in the space with the books, attend our monthly book discussions on the last Sunday of each month.
January - TRAINING SCHOOL FOR NEGRO GIRLS by Camille Acker ⭐️
February- ELOQUENT RAGE by Brittney Cooper
Excited to share that Dr. Cooper will be present for this conversation!! YAY!!🙌🏾
*Please help me keep track of your trades by writing the info down on index cards stacked near non fiction, by writing date and titles*
Thank you so much to Damali, Laylah, Djibril Toure and Ursula Williams for the tactical &logistical support!!! 🖤
Thank you to the EFA team and curators for inviting me to take part in this wonderful show!!
Teachers and Art Educators take your classes to engage with this work, take your best friends and lovers, cousins, neighbors. Offer workshops, take meetings, meet up for lunch dates.
Please take pictures and tag me for the archives.
Enjoy and have fun!!
Dive into this work and let me know what thrills you.
I will be adding more details as time goes on.
This work is collaborative, joyful and sensual. This work is an exploration of the brilliance, beauty, diversity and imagination of Black womanhood and I’m thrilled to share it in this way.
More to come 🤸🏾♂️🤸🏾♂️🖤🖤📚📚☺️☺️
“The historical formation of surveillance is not outside of the historical formation of slavery.”
- Dark Matters: On the Surveillance of Blackness" by Simone Browne
I need someone else to read this book so we can take about it cause it’s blowing my mind and also creeping me out a little bit.
In it Simone talks about how surveillance technologies and practices are racialized, and claims the Black body as a key site of specific conditions that include being monitored and controlled most especially in a Western context. She cites historic examples and offers creating and #creativity as modes of resistance. She talks about everything from branding during times of slavery to the prison industrial complex to facial recognition software to being patted down by TSA. It’s detailed, dense and extremely well written!!
Blessed Black Feminist Thursday Loves!! Excited to share with you that there is a now a mini installation of TFBWL up at JACK, a wonderful award winning performance arts space located at 18 Putnam Avenue in Brooklyn.
From now until late November, you are welcome to engage with this specially curated collection in between, before and after their shows as well as trade books by Black women with the installation. Please check their page and website to find out about all the amazing shows they have coming up for the autumn season. Thank you so much to JACK for inviting us to be part of their beautiful new space and thanks to my dear Naima B for the install assistance!! ♥️♥️📚📚 ⭐️⭐️👌🏿👌🏿
*from here i saw what happened and i cried*
after Carrie Mae Weems
“the blood is red the blues is red the blues
is blood the red is dirt the dirt is brown
the brown is red the dirt is blood the blood
is blues the blues is brown the brown is skin
the skin is blood the blood is kin the kin
is red the red is blood the blood is new
the new is skin the skin is news the news
is brown the brown is noose the noose is red
the red is blues the blues is dirt the dirt
is skin the skin is blues the blues is kin
the kin is brown the brown is blood the blood
is news the news is black the black is new
the new is red the red is noose the noose is black is blues is brown is red is blood”
- one of my fave pieces from the new thick sensual collection of poetic gems known as MORE BLACK by award winning poet T’ai Freedom Ford 🖤⭐️ ____________
We are celebrating National Black Women’s Poetry month on Sunday April 28th at the lovely Brooklyn Tea, in Bedford Stuyvesant, Brooklyn.
Bring your favorite poem written by a Black women to share, come check out the library’s vast collection and trade books by Black women anytime between noon and five. See you then!!
TFBWL BOOKMAIL ♥️🌹
Thank you so much to my lovely friends at @thenewpress for sending me a copy of MOUTHS OF RAIN/AN ANTHOLOGY OF BLACK LESBIAN THOUGHT edited by Briona Simone Jones.
“African-American and Afro Diasporic lesbian writers and theorists have made extra ordinary contributions to feminist theory, activism, and writing. MOUTHS OF RAIN, the companion anthology to Beverly Guy-Sheftall’s classic WORDS OF FIRE, traces the long history of intellectual thought produced by Black lesbian writers, spanning the 19th century through the 21st century. Using “Black lesbian” as a capacious signifiers, MOUTHS OF RAIN includes writing by Black women who have shared intimate and loving relationships with other women, as well as Black women who see bonding as mutual, Black women who who have self identified as lesbian, Black women who have written about Black lesbians, and Black women who theorize about and see the word lesbian as a political descriptive that disrupts and critique of capitalism, hetero sexism, and hetero patriarchy. Taking its title from a poem by Audre Lorde, MOUTHS OF RAIN addresses pervasive issues such as misogynoir and anti-Blackness while also attending to love, romance, “coming out”, and the erotic.”
This gorgeous collection features many of my favorite writers, brilliant literary wonders like Alice Walker, Pamela Sneed, JP Howard, Cheryl Clarke, Jewelle Gomez, Moya Bailey, Pauli Murray, Alexis Pauline Gumbs , Demita Frazier and Pat Parker!!! 🔥🌹🔥🌹🔥