Neo-Underground Railroad Conductors

Join the movement that induces a “freedom of the mind.”

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NURC Reading List

Below is a list of literature from the current and past civil rights movements that fit the message of the NURC movement and would be another source of inspiration and knowledge for our many conductors.

Neo-Civil Rights Generation Literature

The Hip-Hop Generation: Young Blacks and the Crisis in African American Culture - by Bakari Kitwana

The Miseducation of the Negro - by Carter G. Woodson

The Bluest Eye - by Toni Morrison

Who’s Gonna Take the Weight: Manhood, Race, and Power in America - by Kevin Powell

The Rose that Grew from Concrete - Tupac Shakur

They Came Before Columbus: The African Presence in Ancient America - by Ivan Van Sertima

Black Spark, White Fire: Did African Explorers Civilize Ancient Europe? - Richard Poe

And It Don’t Stop: The Best American Hip-Hop Journalism of the Last 25 Years - by Nelson George

Hip-Hop America - by Nelson George

Post-Soul Nation : The Explosive, Contradictory, Triumphant, and Tragic 1980s as Experienced by African Americans (Previously Known as Blacks and Before That Negroes) - by Nelson George

Is Bill Cosby Right?: Or Has the Black Middle Class Lost its Mind? - by Eric Dyson

Driving While Black: What to Do if You are a Victim of Racial Profiling - by Kenneth Meeks

Fight the Power: Rap, Race, & Reality
- by Chuck D

Race Matters - by Cornel West

America Beyond the Color Line: Dialogues with African Americans - by Henry Louis Gates Jr.

The Debt: What America Owes to Blacks - by Randall Robinson

Can’t Stop Won’t Stop: A History of the Hip-Hop Generation - by Jeff Chang

Mapping Human History: Race, Genes, & Our Common Origins - by Steve Olsen

Confessions of a Video Vixen - by Karrine Steffans

Five Percenter Rap: God Hop’s Music, Message, And Black Muslim Mission - by Felicia Miyakawa

Black Noise: Rap Music and Black Culture in Contemporary America - by Tricia Rose

The Rap on Gangsta Rap: Who Run It? Gangsta Rap and Visions of Black Violence - by Bakari Kitwana

Angry Black White Boy: A Novel - by Adam Mansbach

Why White Kids Love Hip Hop: Wangstas, Wiggers, Wannabes, and the New Reality of Race in America - by Bakari Kitwana

Civil Rights Generation Literature

The Autobiography of Malcolm X: As Told To Alex Haley - by Malcolm X & Alex Haley
Malcolm X Speaks: Selected Speeches and Statements - by George Breitman
The Autobiography of Martin Luther King Jr. - by Martin Luther King Jr. and Clayborne Carson

A Knock at Midnight: Inspiration from the Great Sermons of Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. - by Martin Luther King Jr.

Go Tell it on the Mountain - by James Baldwin

James Baldwin : Collected Essays : Notes of a Native Son / Nobody Knows My Name / The Fire Next Time / No Name in the Street / The Devil Finds Work / Other Essays - by James Baldwin & Toni Morrison

The Collected Poetry of Nikki Giovanni (1968-1998) - by Nikki Giovanni

Ego-Tripping and Other Poems for Young People - by Nikki Giovanni

Peculiar Institution: Slavery in the Ante-Bellum South - Kenneth Stampp

Early Civil Rights Generation Literature

The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano : Written by Himself (The Bedford Series in History and Culture) - by Olaudah Equiano

The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass - by Frederick Douglass

Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl - by Harriet Jacobs
Up From Slavery: An Autobiography - by Booker T. Washington

The Souls of Black Folk - by W.E.B. DuBois

The Philosophy and Opinions of Marcus Garvey, Or, Africa for the Africans (The New Marcus Garvey Library, No. 9) - by Marcus Garvey