Ibram X. Kendi
Credit: © Stephen Voss

February is Black History Month, an annual observance of the achievements and culture of Black Americans. This month, Behind the Headlines will feature Black pioneers in a variety of areas.

You have probably heard of racism—and many of you have even experienced it—but have you heard of antiracism? A central idea of antiracism is that it is not enough for people to simply avoid racism. Rather, people must actively look for and work to eradicate racism in their own beliefs and in society’s institutions. Ibram X. Kendi (1982-…), an American author, historian, and activist, is a major advocate for antiracism. Kendi is known for his groundbreaking work as a scholar of race studies and Black history. His writings explore the idea of antiracism and the history of racism in America.

Ibram Henry Rogers was born in New York City on Aug. 13, 1982. He staged his first antiracist protest as a child in the third grade. He noticed that his teacher called on white students while ignoring non-white students. He witnessed her treating Black students disrespectfully. He protested his teacher’s racist behavior by refusing to return to class.

In 2004, he received a bachelor’s degree in journalism and African American studies from Florida A&M University. He received a Ph.D. degree in African American studies from Temple University in 2010. He married the American physician Sadiqa Edmonds in 2013. That year, the couple changed their last name to Kendi, and Ibram changed his middle name to Xolani. Kendi is a humanities professor at Boston University. He is also the founding director of the university’s Center for Antiracist Research.

Kendi has written several books focusing on racism, antiracism, and the Black American experience. His first book, The Black Campus Movement: Black Students and the Racial Reconstitution of Higher Education, 1965-1972, was published in 2012. In 2016, Kendi became the youngest person ever to receive the National Book Award for nonfiction for his book Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America (2016). He went on to write the popular How to Be an Antiracist (2019) and Antiracist Baby (2020), a children’s picture book.

Kendi also wrote the introduction for an adaption of the book Stamped for middle school and teen readers written by Jason Reynolds (1983-…), a popular American author of books for young people. The adaptation is called Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You (2020). Reynolds writes novels and poetry for young adult and middle-grade readers. His works explore a variety of topics from a young person’s perspective. Such topics include the Black experience. They also include such issues as gun and gang violence.

Jason Reynolds
Credit: © Gary Gershoff, Getty Images

Reynolds became interested in poetry at a young age. An interest in rap music inspired him to explore literature. He advocates using rap and comic books as nontraditional ways to reach young readers. Reynolds’s first book, When I Was the Greatest, was published in 2014. It tells the story of three Black teenage boys growing up in the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood of Brooklyn, in New York City. Reynolds often chooses Black teenagers—particularly teenage boys—as his subjects. He portrays the uncertainty or fear many of the boys feel, to encourage young male readers to express their own emotions.