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Transcript: Barack Obama's Speech on Race

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Transcript: Barack Obama's Speech on Race

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Transcript: Barack Obama’s Speech on Race

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Illinois Sen. Barack Obama gave a speech in Philadelphia on Tuesday on the role that race has played in the Democratic presidential campaign. Here, a transcript of the speech, titled “A More Perfect Union.”

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Jason Reynolds & Ibram X. Kendi - “Stamped” and the Story of Racism in the U.S. | The Daily Show

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Jason Reynolds reads from the Long Way Down graphic novel

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/ CBS News

Jason Reynolds is not only a prolific and bestselling author, he's also the national ambassador for young people's literature.

"How does one properly address an ambassador?" asked "Sunday Morning" host Jane Pauley.

"By my first name!" he laughed.

He visits mostly out-of-the-way towns, like Ronan, Montana, on the Flathead Indian reservation, where he met with middle-school students.

Pauley asked, "When you talk to kids, I'll bet you have them way before 'hello'?"

"I hope so!" Reynolds laughed. "When I walk out, 16-year-olds, or 12-year-olds are happy that I look like someone who might be able to connect."

"You're not there to sell your books; you're there to sell them on books?"

"Yes."

"Who's listening?"

"They're all listening," he replied. "I don't sell them on books by selling them on books. The fastest way to lose a child is to tell a child to read."

Instead, he encourages them to embrace their stories. "To me, reading becomes a lot more palatable if young people realize that the stories, the books that exist within them, are as valuable as the books that exist on the outside of them," Reynolds said. "And we have to be able to imagine the stories that don't exist."

His story began in 1983. His parents divorced when he was 10. He grew up with his mom in Maryland, just outside Washington, D.C. He said, "There were places that were safe. There were places that were not. And everyone was doing the best they could to coexist."
Don't nobody
believe nothing
these days
Which is why I haven't
told nobody the story
I'm about to tell you.
From "Long Way Down"
Reynolds evokes his own childhood experiences in his 17 books (many published by Simon & Schuster, a division of CBS' parent company). "I'm thinking about young Jason, the kids in my neighborhood," he said.

"Are your readers primarily Black?" asked Pauley.

"I think that they run the gamut. You have to remember these books are all over America, and all over the world."

"But, unfailingly, you are writing about a Black child."

"Absolutely. My belief is that I get an opportunity to write them into the world. That they are matter, and that they do matter."

"Did you feel invisible, like you didn't matter?"

"I did not have to rely on schooling to give me my visibility, because I had a mother who had more than enough!" he laughed. "So much of my stories are about friends, and the reason why is because I actually think that friendship is the most valuable relationship we'll ever have."

Before he was a prolific poet, he was a precocious 16-year-old college freshman. At the University of Maryland, in 2000, he met classmate Jason Griffin, who described the young Reynolds as "kind of a man, a man-teenager. He was, like, 6'3", 220 pounds, just a towering figure."

"But," Reynolds said, "I didn't have any friends."

One day, seeing Reynolds sitting alone in the dining hall, Griffin was intrigued: "And he has this cool crocheted hat, and so there's my entry. 'I really like your hat.' He was like, 'Yeah. I made it.' And I was like, 'O...kay.'"

Pauley asked, "You crocheted?"

"I would make my own hats, and bags, and everything," Reynolds said. "It was cool to him, but I'm sure there were some people who were like, 'That's strange. He's this hippie kid!'"

Griffin said, "People were definitely surprised when they came into our room and 'Monday Night Football' was on, and there's a bunch of big dudes sittin' around crocheting."

"That's right - everybody had to do it," said Reynolds. "Once I figured out that it was cool for my friends, I was like, 'I can teach you all how to do this!'"

They left college with a book - Reynolds' poems, Griffin's artwork. It went nowhere, and Reynolds sold clothes for the next five years.

But today, Reynolds is a phenomenon in young adult literature. He's sold more than seven million books, including "Stuntboy" ("the greatest superhero you've never ever heard of").

Reynolds might be the bestselling author you've never heard of. And for only the second time in 20 years, he and his longtime friend have collaborated on another book.

Pauley asked Griffin, "I can't help but note the obvious: you have red hair and blue eyes. You are the whitest man in this room."

"Oh, yeah. I win that award often!"

"So, your collaboration with the most successful author of young adult books, who's writing to Black children for all children, where do you come off?"

"You don't think we look alike?" Griffin replied.

Reynolds said, "Jason and I have had every uncomfortable conversation you can have, and figured it out together. I think if anything, perhaps that can be modeled - a friendship, an honest friendship. As much as I love my culture, love being Black, I also love my friend. Both of those things can coexist."

Their latest project, "Ain't Burned All the Bright," is about a kid who's home at the height of the pandemic and the protests over the killing of George Floyd.

Pauley said, "The narrator goes hunting for an oxygen mask. Family is in quarantine. And by the end realizes something important."

"That all the air you'll ever need is in the boredom of your life," Reynolds said, "that the magic is in the minuscule, the mundane."

A few of his books have been banned in some places, like "All American Boys," about two students. One, who is white, witnesses a police officer beating up a classmate.
I was barely twenty feet away. The guy on the ground was black and he looked like he was around my age ... smashing his face into the sidewalk. The blood kept coming.
" If it's a story about race, some white parents are saying that, 'I don't want my child reading this because I don't want them to feel bad about being a white child,'" said Reynolds. "Which is never my intention, by the way. But it's being spun as a controversy, as a way to sort of put the kibosh on complicated conversations that kids are desperately trying to have."

Jason Reynolds is still, happily, comfortably having those complicated conversations. During one of his many school and library visits, a 12-year-old raised his hand: "He says, 'Why is it I almost never see white people in your books?' Now you could feel the air suck out of the room. And my response is, 'Well, it's because I grew up in an all-Black neighborhood. It's all right for those neighborhoods and experiences to be lifted up. Does it bother you?' Now, at this point everyone's holding their breath, as you can imagine."

"I'm leaning forward now!" said Pauley.

"All the adults, right? And everyone's like, 'Oh God.' And he says, 'Why would it bother me? No, I was just asking.' And that is a child!"

For more info:
Story produced by Mary Raffalli. Editor: Ed Givnish.

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Jason Reynolds on stories told for, and by, young readers

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CBS News Jason Reynolds is not only a prolific and bestselling author, he's also the national ambassador for young people's literature. "How does one properly address an ambassador?" asked "Sunday Morning" host Jane Pauley. "By my first name!" he laughed. He visits mostly out-of-the-way towns, like Ronan, Montana, on the Flathead Indian reservation, where he met with middle-school students.

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Jason Reynolds | The Boy in the Black Suit

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Why we seek revenge — and what to do instead

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Getting even can feel thrilling, but it’s worth weighing the cost.

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Try On ‘Black Suit’ For A Beautifully Real Approach To Grief

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Jason Reynolds’ new young adult novel, The Boy in the Black Suit, begins on familiar ground. But this tale of a boy dealing with his mother’s death is tragic, funny, hopeful and almost too realistic.

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27:53 - The Banned “All American Boys” Book

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Jason Reynolds Interview: The Power of Narrative | THE THREAD Documentary Series

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Reviewed by Zetta Elliott

When a friend asked me last fall to address the problems she found in Dear Martin, I hedged. Few people thanked me for pointing out the issues I had with All American Boys (though many were quick to praise Jason Reynolds for his "gracious" response), and I didn't want to become known for "targeting" or "picking on" Black authors when so few of us manage to get published. But in the end, I decided something needed to be said because I've noticed a disturbing trend in publishing: novels by Black authors about police violence against Black boys where White girls take center stage.

I decided not to blog about The Truth of Right Now (2017) by Kara Lee Corthron when I read it last fall. Another friend urged me to read that YA novel; he found the writing superior to The Hate U Give (2017) and couldn't understand why it wasn't garnering equal attention. It's a very different kind of story; a White girl attempts suicide after being raped and exploited by a White male teacher at her high school; when Lily meets Dari, an artistic Black boy with an abusive father and absent mother, her outlook on life changes and she invites him to move in with her and her mother.

Dari then becomes the object of desire for both mother and daughter, and the novel concludes with an ugly confrontation in the street with police. When Lily denies knowing Dari, he is brutalized by police and hospitalized. It was clear to me why this novel didn't achieve the blockbuster status of THUG, and I wondered why such a strong writer would choose to tell this particular story. I support the right of artists to create freely, but with so few Black female YA authors getting published it's frustrating to see several choosing to put the focus on Black boys and White girls. Where does that leave Black girls? Continue reading.

Publisher's Synopsis:

"Raw and gripping." -JASON REYNOLDS, New York Times bestselling coauthor of All American Boys

"A must-read!" -ANGIE THOMAS, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Hate You Give
Raw, captivating, and undeniably real, Nic Stone joins industry giants Jason Reynolds and Walter Dean Myers as she boldly tackles American race relations in this stunning New York Times bestselling debut, a William C. Morris Award Finalist.
Justyce McAllister is a good kid, an honor student, and always there to help a friend--but none of that matters to the police officer who just put him in handcuffs. Despite leaving his rough neighborhood behind, he can't escape the scorn of his former peers or the ridicule of his new classmates.

Justyce looks to the teachings of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. for answers. But do they hold up anymore? He starts a journal to Dr. King to find out.

Then comes the day Justyce goes driving with his best friend, Manny, windows rolled down, music turned up-- way up, sparking the fury of a white off-duty cop beside them. Words fly. Shots are fired. Justyce and Manny are caught in the crosshairs. In the media fallout, it's Justyce who is under attack.

"Vivid and powerful." -Booklist, Starred Review "A visceral portrait of a young man reckoning with the ugly, persistent violence of social injustice." -Publishers Weekly

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Reviewed by Zetta Elliott Review Source: Zetta Elliott Book Author: When a friend asked me last fall to address the problems she found in Dear Martin, I hedged. Few people thanked me for pointing out the issues I had with All American Boys (though many were quick to praise Jason Reynolds for his "gracious" response), and I didn't want [...]

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Further Reading

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The Hill We Climb by Amanda Gorman: 9780593465271 | PenguinRandomHouse.com: Books

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The instant #1 New York Times bestseller and #1 USA Today bestseller Amanda Gorman’s electrifying and historic poem “The Hill We Climb,” read at President Joe Biden’s inauguration.…

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Further Reading

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They tell me to “fix” my hair.
And by fix, they mean straighten, they mean whiten;
but how do you fix this shipwrecked
history of hair? In her most famous…

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Further Reading

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Further Reading

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A stunning graphic novel adaptation of Walter Dean Myers’s New York Times bestseller Monster.
Monster is a multi-award-winning, provocative coming-of-ag…

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Further Reading

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Lies My Teacher Told Me: Young Readers’ Edition - The New Press

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Now adapted for young readers ages 12 through 18, the national bestseller that makes real American history come alive in all of its conflict, drama, and complexity Lies My Teacher Told Me is one of the most important—and successful—history books of our time. Having sold nearly two million copies, the book won an American Book Award and the Oliver Cromwell Cox Award for Distinguished Anti-Racist Scholarship. Now Rebecca Stefoff, the acclaimed nonfiction children’s writer who adapted Howard Zinn’s bestseller A People’s History of the United States for young readers, makes Loewen’s beloved work available to younger students. Essential reading in our age of fake news and slippery, sloppy history, Lies My Teacher Told Me: Young Readers’ Edition cuts through the mindless optimism and outright lies found in most textbooks that are often not even really written by their “authors.” Loewen is, as historian Carol Kammen has said, the history teacher we all should have had. Beginning with pre-Columbian history and then covering characters and events as diverse as the first Thanksgiving, Helen Keller, the My Lai massacre, 9/11, and the Iraq War, Loewen’s lively, provocative telling of American history is a “counter-textbook that retells the story of the American past” (The Nation). This streamlined young readers’ edition is rich in vivid details and quotations from primary sources that poke holes in the textbook versions of history and help students develop a deeper understanding of our world. Lies My Teacher Told Me: Young Readers’ Edition brings this classic text to a new generation of readers (and their parents and teachers) who will welcome and value its honesty, its humor, and its integrity.