Accountability & Reform

A memoir by the co-founder of the Black Lives Matter movement explains the movement's position of love, humanity, and justice, challenging perspectives that have negatively labeled the movement's activists while calling for essential political changes

The essential guide to understanding how racism works and how racial inequality shapes black lives, ultimately offering a road-map for resistance for racial justice advocates and antiracists When #BlackLivesMatter went viral in 2013, it shed a light on the urgent, daily struggles of black Americans to combat racial injustice. The message resonated with millions across the country. Yet many of our political, social, and economic institutions are still embedded with racist policies and practices that devalue black lives. Stay Woke directly addresses these stark injustices and builds on the lessons of racial inequality and intersectionality the Black Lives Matter movement has challenged its fellow citizens to learn. In this essential primer, Tehama Lopez Bunyasi and Candis Watts Smith inspire readers to address the pressing issues of racial inequality, and provide a basic toolkit that will equip readers to become knowledgeable participants in public debate, activism, and politics. This book offers a clear vision of a racially just society, and shows just how far we still need to go to achieve this reality. From activists to students to the average citizen, Stay Woke empowers all readers to work toward a better future for black Americans.

"Coupled with the speed and networking capacities of social media, #blacklivesmatter was the hashtag heard round the world. But Alicia Garza well knew that the distance between a hashtag and real change would take more than a single facebook to cover. It would take a movement. Garza was a lifelong activist who had spent the previous decades educating herself on the hard lessons of organizing. She started as a kid, working on sexual education for her peers, and then moved on to major campaigns around housing, policing, and immigrant and labor rights in California and then nationally. The lessons she extracted were different from the "rules for radicals" that animated earlier generations of lefitists; they were also different than the charismatic, patriarchal model of the American Civil Rights Movement. She instead developed a mode of organizing based on creating deep connections with communities, forging multiracial, intersectional coalitions, and, most of all, calling in all sorts of people to join the fight for the world we all deserve. This is the story of an activist's education on the streets and in the homes of regular people around the country who found ways to come together to create change. And it's also a guide for anyone who wants to share in that education and help build sustainable movements for the 21st century at any level, whether you're fighting for housing justice in your community or advocating for a political candidate or marching in the streets or just voting. It's a new paradigm for change for a new generation of changemakers, from the mind and heart behind one of the most important movements of our time"--

"A probing collection of essays and interviews addressing police brutality and racial injustice Policing has become one of the urgent issues of our time, the target of dramatic movements and front-page coverage from coast to coast in the United States and across the world. Now a wide-ranging collection of writers and activists offers a global response, describing ongoing struggles from New York to Ferguson to Los Angeles, as well as London, San Juan, San Salvador, and beyond. This book, combining first-hand accounts from organizers with the interventions of scholars and contributions by leading artists, traces the global rise of the "broken-windows" strategy of policing, first established in New York City under Police Commissioner William Bratton, a doctrine that has vastly broadened police power and contributed to the contemporary crisis of policing that has been sparked by notorious incidents of police brutality and killings. With contributions from #BlackLivesMatter cofounder Patrisse Cullors, Ferguson activist and St. Louis University law professor Justin Hansford, poet Mart��n Espada, scholars Ruth Wilson Gilmore, Robin D.G. Kelley, Naomi Murakawa, Vijay Prashad, and many more"--

"A comprehensive, readable analysis of the key issues of the Black Lives Matter movement, this thought-provoking and compelling anthology features essays by some of the nation's most influential and respected criminal justice experts and legal scholars. Policing the Black Man explores and critiques the many ways the criminal justice system impacts the lives of African American boys and men at every stage of the criminal process, from arrest through sentencing. Essays range from an explication of the historical roots of racism in the criminal justice system to an examination of modern-day police killings of unarmed black men. The contributors discuss and explain racial profiling, the power and discretion of police and prosecutors, the role of implicit bias, the racial impact of police and prosecutorial decisions, the disproportionate imprisonment of black men, the collateral consequences of mass incarceration, and the Supreme Court's failure to provide meaningful remedies for the injustices in the criminal justice system. Policing the Black Man is an enlightening must-read for anyone interested in the critical issues of race and justice in America."--Jacket

"Started in the wake of George Zimmerman's 2013 acquittal in the death of Trayvon Martin, the #BlackLivesMatter movement has become a powerful and uncompromising campaign demanding redress for the brutal and unjustified treatment of black bodies by law enforcement in the United States. The movement is only a few years old, but as Christopher J. Lebron argues in this book, the sentiment behind it is not; the plea and demand that "Black Lives Matter" comes out of a much older and richer tradition arguing for the equal dignity--and not just equal rights--of black people. The Making of Black Lives Matter presents a condensed and accessible intellectual history that traces the genesis of the ideas that have built into the #BlackLivesMatter movement. Drawing on the work of revolutionary black public intellectuals, including Frederick Douglass, Ida B. Wells, Langston Hughes, Zora Neal Hurston, Anna Julia Cooper, Audre Lorde, James Baldwin, and Martin Luther King, Jr., Lebron clarifies what it means to assert that "Black Lives Matter" when faced with contemporary instances of anti-black law enforcement. He also illuminates the crucial difference between the problem signaled by the social media hashtag and how we think that we ought to address the problem. As Lebron states, police body cameras, or even the exhortation for civil rights mean nothing in the absence of equality and dignity. To upset dominant practices of abuse, oppression and disregard, we must reach instead for radical sensibility. Radical sensibility requires that we become cognizant of the history of black thought and activism in order to make sense of the emotions, demands, and argument of present-day activists and public thinkers. Only in this way can we truly embrace and pursue the idea of racial progress in America."--Jacket.

"In the wake of the murder of unarmed teenager Trayvon Martin in 2012 and the exoneration of his killer, three black women activists launched a hashtag and social-media platform, Black Lives Matter, which would become the rubric for a larger movement. To many, especially those in the media, Black Lives Matter appeared to burst onto the national political landscape out of thin air. But as Barbara Ransby shows in Making All Black Lives Matter, the movement has roots in prison abolition, anti-police violence, black youth movements, and radical mobilizations across the country dating back at least a decade. Ransby interviewed more than a dozen of the movement's principal organizers and activists, and she provides a detailed review of its extensive coverage in mainstream and social media. Making All Black Lives Matter offers one of the first overviews of Black Lives Matter and explores the challenges and possible future for this growing and influential movement"--Provided by publisher.

"As a leader of the Black Lives Matter movement, Shaun King has become one of the most recognizable and powerful voices on the front lines of civil rights in our time. His commitment to reforming the justice system and making America a more equitable place has brought challenges and triumphs, soaring victories and crushing defeats. Throughout his wide-ranging activism, King's commentary remains rooted in both exhaustive research and abundant passion. In Make Change, King offers an inspiring look at the moments that have shaped his life and considers the ways social movements can grow and evolve in this hyper-connected era. He shares stories from his efforts leading the Raise the Age campaign and his work fighting police brutality, while providing a roadmap for how to stay sane, safe, and motivated even in the worst of political climates. By turns infuriating, inspiring, and educational, Make Change will resonate with those who believe that America can-and must-do better"--

* Book seizes on the Black Lives Matter movement in the wake of Ferguson and the police murders of Mike Brown and Eric Garner. * Shows a way forward in the struggle for Black liberation in the age of Obama and America's "post-racial" society. * Builds off of the success of books like The New Jim Crow * #blacklivesmatter Is the American Dialect Society's 2014 Word of the Year

Black Lives Matter Managing Director, Kailee Scales is joined by Activist Tamika Mallory, Co-founder of Until Freedom, and Taylor Family Attorney Lonita Baker to discuss the brutal shooting of Breonna Taylor, a 26-year-old EMT who was killed by police officers in her own home, and the ongoing marginalization of police violence against Black lives.

On July 10, 2015, a 28 year-old black woman named Sandra Bland was pulled over in a small Texas town for failing to use a turn signal when she changed lanes. She was ultimately arrested and taken to the county jail. Three days later, she was found dead in her cell. The official coroner's report ruled the death a suicide, but many people believe that Sandra Bland was murdered. Sandy, as she was known to her family and friends, became a national figure in the Black Lives Matter Movement and "Say H

Listen to this episode from Today, Explained on Spotify. There hasn’t been an arrest in the case in the three months since police shot and killed Taylor in her home in Louisville, Kentucky. But now the “Justice for Breonna” movement has the potential to unseat Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

#SayHerName Essay discussion with Professor Catherine Squires from the book "Dangerous Discourse"

NPR's Mary Louise Kelly speaks with Kimberlé Crenshaw, co-founder of the Say Her Name campaign, about how the Black Lives Matter movement can be more inclusive of Black women.

Last night on Instagram Live I took time to really break down and explain the systems, structures, and people that are responsible for Breonna's murder and the subsequent lack of justice and accountability. I want you to hear that entire conversation. Later today, on The Breakdown Live, I will give us solutions and action steps. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

All is not lost. I see multiple pathways to change, justice, and accountability for Breonna Taylor. Today, I'll share some clear action steps for us. ---- If you listen to The Breakdown and want to help support the work we do, consider becoming a member of our Patreon at www.patreon.com/thebreakdown for exclusive members perks and early access to content. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In the police reform debate, the question of holding officers accountable is a key issue. But the way things are, prosecutors often work in conjunction with the police.

Kimberlé Crenshaw and the African American Policy Forum started the #SayHerName campaign to bring awareness to often invisible names of Black women who have been targets of law enforcement.

Journalist and author Mychal Denzel Smith joins us for a wide-ranging discussion on the uprising against racist police, the upcoming presidential election and why he says a Biden win won’t cure his Trump-era depression, and his new book, “Stakes Is High: Life after the American Dream.” Denzel Smith questions whether arresting and charging the police officers who killed Breonna Taylor, a core demand of many protests in the wake of her death, represents justice, despite the historic settlement between Louisville and her family. “The only way to prevent another instance of the situation that took Breonna Taylor’s life is to defund, dismantle police departments across the nation,” Smith says. He argues defeating Donald Trump in November will not solve systemic racism, inequality or the climate crisis. “What Joe Biden has offered thus far is not a transformative enough agenda to be able to face those issues.” #DemocracyNow Democracy Now! is an independent global news hour that airs on nearly 1,400 TV and radio stations Monday through Friday. Watch our livestream 8-9AM ET: https://democracynow.org Please consider supporting independent media by making a donation to Democracy Now! today: https://democracynow.org/donate FOLLOW DEMOCRACY NOW! ONLINE: YouTube: http://youtube.com/democracynow Facebook: http://facebook.com/democracynow Twitter: https://twitter.com/democracynow Instagram: http://instagram.com/democracynow SoundCloud: http://soundcloud.com/democracynow iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/podcast/democracy-now!-audio/id73802554 Daily Email Digest: https://democracynow.org/subscribe

The city of Louisville, Kentucky, will pay a historic $12 million settlement to the family of Breonna Taylor, more than six months after police shot and killed the 26-year-old Black emergency room technician in her own apartment and Taylor became a household name as part of the nationwide uprising in defense of Black lives. It is one of the largest payouts ever for a police killing of a Black person in the U.S. The city will also institute major reforms to the police department responsible for Taylor’s death. Louisville Mayor Greg Fischer announced the settlement at a press conference, where he was joined by members of Taylor’s family. We air excerpts from the remarkable press conference. #DemocracyNow Democracy Now! is an independent global news hour that airs on nearly 1,400 TV and radio stations Monday through Friday. Watch our livestream 8-9AM ET: https://democracynow.org Please consider supporting independent media by making a donation to Democracy Now! today: https://democracynow.org/donate FOLLOW DEMOCRACY NOW! ONLINE: YouTube: http://youtube.com/democracynow Facebook: http://facebook.com/democracynow Twitter: https://twitter.com/democracynow Instagram: http://instagram.com/democracynow SoundCloud: http://soundcloud.com/democracynow iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/podcast/democracy-now!-audio/id73802554 Daily Email Digest: https://democracynow.org/subscribe

Black women are disproportionately victims of police brutality, but activists say they've been left behind and erased from the mainstream fight against police violence. Subscribe to HuffPost today: http://goo.gl/xW6HG Support our work: https://www.huffpost.com/subscribe Read: https://www.huffpost.com/ Like: https://www.facebook.com/HuffPost Follow: https://twitter.com/huffpost

Sisters of the late Sandra Bland, Sharon Cooper, Shavon Bland, Joy Phillips, Shante Needham, and lawyer Cannon Lambert sat down with Ebro in the Morning to remember the late Sandra Bland who passed away while in jail in 2015 causing tons of controversy due to its cause and coverup, and speak about the entire case overall. Say Her Name: The Life and Death Of Sandra Bland airs on HBO Monday, December 3. #HOT97 SUBSCRIBE: http://bit.ly/HOT97Subscribe More @ http://www.hot97.com or the HOT 97 App: http://bit.ly/HOT97APPWORLDWIDE INSTAGRAM: https://www.instagram.com/hot97 TWITTER: https://twitter.com/HOT97 FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/HOT97OFFICIAL

In honor of the nation-wide #SayHerName Week of Action (June 11th-17th), AAPF has joined BYP 100 and numerous racial justice and gender justice organizations in uplifting the stories of Black women, girls and femmes who have been victimized by state violence, and demanding justice for them and their families. This video, the first in a series of three, lifts up the voices of mothers who have lost their daughters to police violence. The #SayHerName Mothers Network was first officially convened by AAPF in November 2016, a year and a half after many of the mothers joined us in New York City to launch the Say Her Name Report and attend the first ever #SayHerName Vigil in Union Square. Since then, the #SayHerName Mothers Network has joined together on a number of occasions, marching at the Women’s March on Washington, lobbying for police reform on Capitol Hill, and joining together for several focus groups and planning sessions to strategize around the initiative and to assess the needs of new family members who’ve lost their daughters to police violence. This video is dedicated to Vicky Coles-McAdory, aunty-mama of India Beaty and one of the original members of the #SayHerName Family Network, who tragically died of a stroke last September. Learn more about the campaign by visiting our website (aapf.org) and social media pages (@aapolicyforum). #SayHerName

Invisible No More: Racial Profiling and Police Brutality Against Women and LGBTQ People of Color, full-length lecture by Andrea Ritchie, author of Invisible No More: Police Violence Against Black Women and Women of Color, on racial profiling and police violence against Black women. Recorded at Barnard College in May 2016.

"A treatise of Black women's transformative influence in media, entertainment, and politics, and why this intersectional movement building, especially on Twitter, is essential to the resistance In Reclaiming Our Space, social worker, activist, and cultural commentator Feminista Jones explores how Black women are changing culture, society, and the landscape of feminism by building digital communities and using social media as powerful platforms. Complex conversations around race, class, and gender that have been happening behind the closed doors of academia for decades are now becoming part of the wider cultural vernacular--one pithy tweet at a time. These online platforms have given those outside the traditional university setting an opportunity to engage with and advance these conversations--and in doing so have created new energy for intersectional movements around the world. It has been a seismic shift, and as Jones argues, no one has had more to do with this renaissance of commu nity building than Black women. As Jones reveals, some of the best-loved devices of our shared social media language are a result of Black women's innovations, from well-known movement-building hashtags (#BlackLivesMatter, #SayHerName, and #BlackGirlMagic) to the now ubiquitous use of threaded tweets as a marketing and storytelling tool. For some, these online dialogues provide an introduction to the work of Black feminist icons like Angela Davis, Barbara Smith, bell hooks, and the women of the Combahee River Collective. For others, this discourse provides a platform for continuing their feminist activism and scholarship in a new interactive way. With these important online conversations, not only are Black women influencing popular culture and creating sociopolitical movements; they are also galvanizing a new generation to learn and engage in Black feminist thought and theory, and inspiring change in communities around them. Hard-hitting, intelligent, incisive, yet bursting with humor ^and pop-culture savvy, Reclaiming Our Space is a survey of Black feminism's past, present, and future, and places Black women front and center in a new chapter of resistance and political engagement"--;"45 years ago, Black American feminists convened as architects for a new revolution that thrives today, finding its home and building its strengths within Black women's online communities and digital spaces"--;Black women are changing culture, society, and the landscape of feminism by building digital communities and using social media as powerful platforms. These online platforms have given those outside the traditional university setting an opportunity to create new energy for intersectional movements around the world. It has been a seismic shift, and as Jones argues, no one has had more to do with this renaissance of community building than Black women. These online conversations are influencing popular culture and creating sociopolitical movements; as well as galvanizing a new generation to learn and engage in Black feminist thought and theory, and inspiring change in communities around them. -- adapted from publisher info

"Fifteen-year-old Diamond stopped going to school the day she was expelled for lashing out at peers who constantly harassed and teased her for something everyone on the staff had missed: she was being trafficked for sex. After months on the run, she was arrested and sent to a detention center for violating a court order to attend school. Black girls represent 16 percent of female students but almost half of all girls with a school-related arrest. The first trade book to tell these untold stories, Pushout exposes a world of confined potential and supports the growing movement to address the policies, practices, and cultural illiteracy that push countless students out of school and into unhealthy, unstable, and often unsafe futures. For four years Monique W. Morris, author of Black Stats, chronicled the experiences of black girls across the country whose intricate lives are misunderstood, highly judged-by teachers, administrators, and the justice system-and degraded by the very institutions charged with helping them flourish. Morris shows how, despite obstacles, stigmas, stereotypes, and despair, black girls still find ways to breathe remarkable dignity into their lives in classrooms, juvenile facilities, and beyond"--Provided by publisher.

"For many, the story of the weeks of protests in the summer of 2020 began with the horrific nine minutes and twenty-nine seconds when Police Officer Derek Chauvin killed George Floyd on camera, and it ended with the sweeping federal, state, and intrapersonal changes that followed. It is a simple story, wherein white America finally witnessed enough brutality to move their collective consciousness. The only problem is that it isn't true. George Floyd was not the first Black man to be killed by police-he wasn't even the first to inspire nation-wide protests-yet his death came at a time when America was already at a tipping point. In say their names, five seasoned journalists probe this critical shift. With a piercing examination of how inequality has been propagated throughout history, from Black imprisonment and the Convict Leasing program to long-standing predatory medical practices to over-policing, the authors highlight the disparities that have long characterized the dangers of being Black in America. They examine the many moderate attempts to counteract these inequalities, from the modern Civil Rights movement to Ferguson, and how the killings of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and others pushed compliance with an unjust system to its breaking point. Finally, they outline the momentous changes that have resulted from this movement, while at the same time proposing necessary next steps to move forward. With a combination of penetrating, focused journalism and affecting personal insight, the authors bring together their collective years of reporting, creating a cohesive and comprehensive understanding of racial inequality in America"--

Black women’s interaction with the state, through law enforcement, is marked by violence. Black women are murdered by the police.4 They are assaulted and injured by the police.5 They are arrested unlawfully by the police;6 and finally they are tried, convicted and incarcerated for defending themselves against nonpolice violence.7 State violence against Black women is long-standing, pervasive, persistent, and multilayered, yet few legal actors seem to care about it. This Article will bring together the strands of scholarship that exists across several fields on the dilemma of state sponsored violence against Black women, to highlight for legal scholars the depth of the problems Black women experience. The relationship between Black women and the state was birthed in violence, through the establishment of slavery in the colonial world. Part I of this Article explores the historical roots of Black women’s interaction with the state. The historical exploration is necessary because in the foundational years of interaction between Black women and White colonists the process of dehumanization and genesis of cultural stereotypes were created. Throughout the research cited in this Article, contemporary linkages to both legal policy, as well as law enforcement behavior will be made to stereotypes fostered and maintained through slavery.

The Prison Policy Initiative produces cutting edge research to expose the broader harm of mass criminalization, and then sparks advocacy campaigns to create a more just society.

We analyze gender and racial disparities in traffic and street stops, including arrests, searches, and use of force that occurs during stops.