Columbians Named to NYPL/Schomburg Center’s 100 Books by Black Authors List

This Black History Month, the New York Public Library's Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture has unveiled an incredible "100 Black Voices: Schomburg Centennial Reading List," which "features 100 books personally selected by some of today's most celebrated Black writers, artists, and luminaries." Columbia University connections abound on the list, including current and former faculty, alumni, and authors whose work is archived in the Columbia Libraries.

Columbia affiliations on the list include (but are not limited to):

• Professor of Writing Paul Beatty's "The Sellout"
• Wun Tsun Tam Mellon Professor of the Humanities Edwidge Danticat's "The Farming of Bones"
• Nikki Giovanni's "Black Feeling, Black Talk/Black Judgement," which she wrote while an MFA student at Columbia
• University Professor Saidiya Hartman's "Lose Your Mother: A Journey Along the Atlantic Slave Route"
• Zora Neale Hurston (BC 1928)'s "Their Eyes Were Watching God"
• June Jordan (BC'67)'s "Civil Wars"
• Audre Lorde (LS'60)'s "Zami: A New Spelling of My Name"
• African American and African Diaspora Studies Department Founding Director Manning Marable's "How Capitalism Underdeveloped Black America"
• Claudia Rankine (SOA'93)'s "Citizen: An American Lyric"
• Union Theological Seminary Dietrich Bonhoeffer Professor of Philosophy & Christian Practice Cornel West's "Race Matters"

Amiri Baraka (previously known as LeRoi Jones) is represented on the list with "Dutchman and The Slave: Two Plays." Baraka's papers and an audiovisual collection are archived at Columbia Libraries.

Elizabeth Alexander, president of the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and former Columbia professor, is also represented on the list with her poetry collection "American Sublime."

Through Feb. 28, NYPL cardholders can immediately access e-book and audiobook versions of the titles on the 100 Black Voices list.

The list was curated by the Schomburg Center's Jean Blackwell Hutson Research and Reference Division, with help from writers, artists, and journalists such as Columbia Journalism School Dean Jelani Cobb, University Professor Farah Jasmine Griffin, and A'Lelia Bundles Community Scholar Eric K. Washington, among others. 

Jean Blackwell Hutson (1914-1998) herself was a Columbia alumna, having graduated with her bachelor's degree from Barnard College in 1935, her master's in library science from the Columbia University School of Library Service in 1936, and a teaching certificate in 1941. Blackwell Hutson was critical in building the Schomburg Center's collection as its curator for nearly 40 years.

Did we miss a Columbia connection of note? Let us know at [email protected].