Black Immigrants in the United States: Essays on the Politics of Race, Language, and Voice - Paperback

by Ayanna Cooper (Volume Editor), Awad Ibrahim (Volume Editor)

In the United States, 'immigrant' is a complicated category. It is used interchangeably with 'refugee' and it is, most of the time, linked to South America, especially Latina/os. Black Immigrants in the United States is arguing that immigrants are not refugees and, whether coming from the Caribbean, Latin America or Africa, Black immigrants are oft-silenced in immigration studies and unsystematically researched. Being one of the first books on the topic in the United States, Black Immigrants in the United States is a crack, a verse in the syntax which links Blackness and immigration; a required reading for anyone who is interested in immigration generally and Black immigration in particular. For example, did you know that 12-13% of the statistically defined as African Americans are 'Black immigrants' (both immigrants and refugees) (Ogunipe, 2011)? Out of this 12-13%, did you know the first and second-generation constitute 41% of Black first-year students in Ivy League? Black Immigrants in the United States is an attempt to answer these questions and paint a picture for this population, where they come from, what languages and histories they bring with them to the United States, and discusses their challenges as well as their triumphs. With this book, as children of migration ourselves, we are turning researching and writing about Black immigrants into acts of love and reading about them into an expression of jouissance.

Author Biography

Ayanna Cooper is an author, advocate, keynote speaker, and owner of ACooper Consulting. Her projects involve providing technical assistance to state departments of education, school districts, and organizations with the goal of protecting the civil rights and improving outcomes for culturally and linguistically diverse learners.

Awad Ibrahim is an award-winning author and a professor at the Faculty of Education, University of Ottawa, Canada. He is a Curriculum Theorist with special interest in cultural studies, applied linguistics, Hip-Hop, youth and Black popular culture, philosophy and sociology of education, social justice, diasporic and continental African identities, and ethnography.