Reference and Books
Books, memoirs and edited volumes by and about Black men — the scholarship of Black Men's Studies alongside the autobiography, fiction and criticism the field grew out of. Each record carries its citation, themes and verification status.
How works are classified
Three categories rather than one “by and about” field, because they answer different questions and a work can hold more than one.
By Black man (25)
Authored or co-authored by a Black man, whatever the subject. Assigned only where identity is documented, never inferred.
About Black men (15)
Substantially focused on Black men, boys, manhood, masculinity, or a defined Black male population.
Black male-centered (20)
Foregrounds Black men's lives, knowledge, institutions, cultural production or representation — the core of Black Men's Studies.
The collection
Search by title, author, institution or subject; narrow by relationship category or theme. Open any record for its citation, access status and verification note.
Are We Not Men? Masculine Anxiety and the Problem of African-American Identity
Harper, Phillip Brian · 1996 · Oxford University Press
Book
Why it matters
Examines how anxieties about masculinity shape claims to authentic Black identity, with sustained attention to sexuality.
Relationship to Black men
Black male-centered; By Black man
Identity basis. Author identity publicly self-documented
Details
Literature
Print or licensed
Citation
Harper, Phillip Brian. Are We Not Men? Masculine Anxiety and the Problem of African-American Identity. Oxford University Press, 1996.
Bad Boys: Public Schools in the Making of Black Masculinity
Ferguson, Ann Arnett · 2000 · University of Michigan Press
Book
Why it matters
Ethnography of how an elementary school sorts Black boys into troublemakers, showing discipline as identity production rather than response to behaviour.
Relationship to Black men
About Black men
Details
Education
Print or licensed
Citation
Ferguson, Ann Arnett. Bad Boys: Public Schools in the Making of Black Masculinity. University of Michigan Press, 2000.
Between the World and Me
Coates, Ta-Nehisi · 2015 · Spiegel & Grau
Book
Why it matters
A letter from a father to his son on inhabiting a Black male body in America. National Book Award winner and among the most widely read works of Black male autobiography of the century.
Relationship to Black men
Black male-centered; By Black man
Identity basis. Author identity publicly self-documented
Details
Literature
Print or licensed
Black Boy: A Record of Childhood and Youth
Wright, Richard · 1945 · Harper & Brothers
Memoir
Why it matters
Wright's account of a Mississippi boyhood and his migration north. A central text for the study of Black boyhood under Jim Crow.
Relationship to Black men
Black male-centered; By Black man
Identity basis. Author identity publicly documented
Details
Literature
Print or licensed
Citation
Wright, Richard. Black Boy: A Record of Childhood and Youth. Harper & Brothers, 1945.
Black Masculinity and the U.S. South: From Uncle Tom to Gangsta
Richardson, Riché · 2007 · University of Georgia Press
Book
Why it matters
Regional study of how southern Black masculinities have been figured from minstrelsy through hip-hop.
Relationship to Black men
About Black men
Details
Literature
Print or licensed
Citation
Richardson, Riché. Black Masculinity and the U.S. South: From Uncle Tom to Gangsta. University of Georgia Press, 2007.
Black Men's Studies: Black Manhood and Masculinities in the U.S. Context
McDougal III, Serie · 2020 · Peter Lang
Book
Why it matters
Sets out Black Men's Studies as a distinct interdisciplinary field with its own methods and questions. The controlled-vocabulary anchor for this collection.
Relationship to Black men
Black male-centered; By Black man
Identity basis. Author identity publicly self-documented in institutional profile
Details
African American and Africana studies
Print or licensed
Citation
McDougal III, Serie. Black Men's Studies: Black Manhood and Masculinities in the U.S. Context. Peter Lang, 2020.
Brothers and Keepers
Wideman, John Edgar · 1984 · Holt, Rinehart and Winston
Memoir
Why it matters
A novelist writes about his imprisoned brother and the divergence between two lives begun in the same house. A key text on incarceration and kinship.
Relationship to Black men
Black male-centered; By Black man
Identity basis. Author identity publicly documented
Details
Literature
Print or licensed
Code of the Street: Decency, Violence, and the Moral Life of the Inner City
Anderson, Elijah · 1999 · W. W. Norton
Book
Why it matters
Ethnography of inner-city Philadelphia distinguishing decent and street orientations. Influential and contested; read alongside critiques of its framing.
Relationship to Black men
About Black men; By Black man
Identity basis. Author identity publicly self-documented
Details
Sociology
Print or licensed
Citation
Anderson, Elijah. Code of the Street: Decency, Violence, and the Moral Life of the Inner City. W. W. Norton, 1999.
Constructing the Black Masculine: Identity and Ideality in African American Men's Literature and Culture, 1775-1995
Wallace, Maurice O. · 2002 · Duke University Press
Book
Why it matters
Traces Black male self-fashioning across two centuries of literature, photography and fraternal ritual.
Relationship to Black men
Black male-centered; By Black man
Identity basis. Author identity publicly self-documented
Details
Literature
Print or licensed
Citation
Wallace, Maurice O.. Constructing the Black Masculine: Identity and Ideality in African American Men's Literature and Culture, 1775-1995. Duke University Press, 2002.
Countering the Conspiracy to Destroy Black Boys
Kunjufu, Jawanza · 1985 · African American Images
Book
Why it matters
An independently published series that shaped a generation of community programming for Black boys, outside the university presses.
Relationship to Black men
Black male-centered; By Black man
Identity basis. Author identity publicly self-documented
Details
Education
Print or licensed
Citation
Kunjufu, Jawanza. Countering the Conspiracy to Destroy Black Boys. African American Images, 1985.
For White Folks Who Teach in the Hood... and the Rest of Y'all Too: Reality Pedagogy and Urban Education
Emdin, Christopher · 2016 · Beacon Press
Book
Why it matters
Argues for reality pedagogy built from students' own cultural knowledge, drawing on the author's science teaching in urban classrooms.
Relationship to Black men
About Black men; By Black man
Identity basis. Author identity publicly self-documented
Details
Education
Print or licensed
Citation
Emdin, Christopher. For White Folks Who Teach in the Hood... and the Rest of Y'all Too: Reality Pedagogy and Urban Education. Beacon Press, 2016.
Go Tell It on the Mountain
Baldwin, James · 1953 · Knopf
Book
Why it matters
Baldwin's first novel, tracing a Harlem boy's fourteenth birthday and his relationship with his stepfather and the storefront church. Largely autobiographical.
Relationship to Black men
Black male-centered; By Black man
Identity basis. Author identity publicly documented
Details
Literature
Print or licensed
Invisible Man
Ellison, Ralph · 1952 · Random House
Book
Why it matters
The central American novel of Black male invisibility, following an unnamed narrator from a southern college to Harlem. National Book Award, 1953.
Relationship to Black men
Black male-centered; By Black man
Identity basis. Author identity publicly documented
Details
Literature
Print or licensed
Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption
Stevenson, Bryan · 2014 · Spiegel & Grau
Book
Why it matters
Account of the Equal Justice Initiative's capital defence work, centred on the case of Walter McMillian. Widely used in undergraduate teaching.
Relationship to Black men
About Black men; By Black man
Identity basis. Author identity publicly self-documented
Details
Law
Print or licensed
Citation
Stevenson, Bryan. Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption. Spiegel & Grau, 2014.
Looking for Leroy: Illegible Black Masculinities
Neal, Mark Anthony · 2013 · New York University Press
Book
Why it matters
Reads figures from Jay-Z to Avon Barksdale to argue for Black male legibility as a cultural and political problem.
Relationship to Black men
Black male-centered; By Black man
Identity basis. Author identity publicly self-documented
Details
Communication and media studies
Print or licensed
Citation
Neal, Mark Anthony. Looking for Leroy: Illegible Black Masculinities. New York University Press, 2013.
Manchild in the Promised Land
Brown, Claude · 1965 · Macmillan
Memoir
Why it matters
An autobiographical account of growing up in Harlem in the 1940s and 1950s, written from inside the first northern-born generation of the Great Migration.
Relationship to Black men
Black male-centered; By Black man
Identity basis. Author identity publicly documented
Details
Literature
Print or licensed
Marked: Race, Crime, and Finding Work in an Era of Mass Incarceration
Pager, Devah · 2007 · University of Chicago Press
Book
Why it matters
Audit study finding that white applicants with a criminal record received more callbacks than Black applicants without one. Among the most cited empirical results on hiring discrimination.
Relationship to Black men
About Black men
Details
Sociology
Print or licensed
Citation
Pager, Devah. Marked: Race, Crime, and Finding Work in an Era of Mass Incarceration. University of Chicago Press, 2007.
Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave
Douglass, Frederick · 1845 · Anti-Slavery Office, Boston
Memoir
Why it matters
The foundational American slave narrative, and an explicit account of literacy and manhood as instruments of freedom. Public domain and widely available in full text.
Relationship to Black men
Black male-centered; By Black man
Details
History
Open access
Citation
Douglass, Frederick. Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave. Anti-Slavery Office, Boston, 1845.
New Black Man
Neal, Mark Anthony · 2005 · Routledge
Book
Why it matters
Argues for a Black masculinity that rejects patriarchal and homophobic models, drawing on popular culture and the author's own fatherhood.
Relationship to Black men
Black male-centered; By Black man
Identity basis. Author identity publicly self-documented
Details
African American and Africana studies
Print or licensed
On Black Men
Marriott, David · 2000 · Edinburgh University Press
Book
Why it matters
Psychoanalytic and cultural reading of how images of Black men circulate, including lynching photography and film. Theoretically demanding; a standard reference in the field.
Relationship to Black men
About Black men
Details
Cultural studies
Print or licensed
Parallel Time: Growing Up in Black and White
Staples, Brent · 1994 · Pantheon
Memoir
Why it matters
Memoir by the journalist whose essay on altering his behaviour to reduce the fear he provoked in public space became a standard teaching text.
Relationship to Black men
Black male-centered; By Black man
Identity basis. Author identity publicly self-documented
Details
Literature
Print or licensed
Progressive Black Masculinities
Mutua, Athena D. (ed.) · 2006 · Routledge
Edited book
Why it matters
Collection defining progressive Black masculinity as a political project, spanning law, sociology and cultural criticism.
Relationship to Black men
About Black men; Black male-centered
Details
Law
Print or licensed
Punished: Policing the Lives of Black and Latino Boys
Rios, Victor M. · 2011 · New York University Press
Book
Why it matters
Ethnography of young men under constant surveillance in Oakland, introducing the idea of a youth control complex linking school, police and probation.
Relationship to Black men
About Black men
Details
Criminology
Print or licensed
Citation
Rios, Victor M.. Punished: Policing the Lives of Black and Latino Boys. New York University Press, 2011.
Rituals of Blood: Consequences of Slavery in Two American Centuries
Patterson, Orlando · 1998 · Civitas
Book
Why it matters
Historical sociology of gender relations and lynching after slavery. Contested in its conclusions and important to the debate.
Relationship to Black men
About Black men; By Black man
Identity basis. Author identity publicly documented
Details
Sociology
Print or licensed
Citation
Patterson, Orlando. Rituals of Blood: Consequences of Slavery in Two American Centuries. Civitas, 1998.
Scripting the Black Masculine Body: Identity, Discourse, and Racial Politics in Popular Media
Jackson II, Ronald L. · 2006 · State University of New York Press
Book
Why it matters
Develops Black masculine identity theory to analyse how media scripts are written onto Black male bodies.
Relationship to Black men
Black male-centered; By Black man
Identity basis. Author identity publicly self-documented
Details
Communication and media studies
Print or licensed
Citation
Jackson II, Ronald L.. Scripting the Black Masculine Body: Identity, Discourse, and Racial Politics in Popular Media. State University of New York Press, 2006.
The Autobiography of Malcolm X
Malcolm X; Haley, Alex · 1965 · Grove Press
Memoir
Why it matters
As-told-to autobiography covering Malcolm X's childhood, imprisonment, conversion and political transformation. Among the most influential accounts of Black male self-reinvention.
Relationship to Black men
Black male-centered; By Black man
Identity basis. Subject and collaborator identities publicly documented
Details
History
Print or licensed
The Condemnation of Blackness: Race, Crime, and the Making of Modern Urban America
Muhammad, Khalil Gibran · 2010 · Harvard University Press
Book
Why it matters
Traces how crime statistics were produced and deployed to construct Black criminality after emancipation. Essential background for reading any modern dataset about Black men.
Relationship to Black men
About Black men; By Black man
Identity basis. Author identity publicly self-documented
Details
History
Print or licensed
Citation
Muhammad, Khalil Gibran. The Condemnation of Blackness: Race, Crime, and the Making of Modern Urban America. Harvard University Press, 2010.
The Fire Next Time
Baldwin, James · 1963 · Dial Press
Book
Why it matters
Two essays, one addressed to Baldwin's nephew, on race, religion and the terms of American citizenship. A direct antecedent of Coates's Between the World and Me.
Relationship to Black men
Black male-centered; By Black man
Identity basis. Author identity publicly documented
Details
Literature
Print or licensed
The Man-Not: Race, Class, Genre, and the Dilemmas of Black Manhood
Curry, Tommy J. · 2017 · Temple University Press
Book
Why it matters
Argues that Black men are theorized through categories that do not fit them, and makes the case for Black Male Studies as a separate field. Won the American Book Award.
Relationship to Black men
Black male-centered; By Black man
Identity basis. Author identity publicly self-documented
Details
Philosophy
Print or licensed
Citation
Curry, Tommy J.. The Man-Not: Race, Class, Genre, and the Dilemmas of Black Manhood. Temple University Press, 2017.
The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness
Alexander, Michelle · 2010 · The New Press
Book
Why it matters
Argues that mass incarceration functions as a racial caste system, with Black men its principal subjects. The most widely cited popular work on the subject.
Relationship to Black men
About Black men
Details
Law
Print or licensed
Citation
Alexander, Michelle. The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness. The New Press, 2010.
The Other Wes Moore: One Name, Two Fates
Moore, Wes · 2010 · Spiegel & Grau
Book
Why it matters
Parallel biography of the author and another man of the same name serving life in prison. Widely used in first-year college reading programmes.
Relationship to Black men
Black male-centered; By Black man
Identity basis. Author identity publicly self-documented
Details
Literature
Print or licensed
The Souls of Black Folk
Du Bois, W. E. B. · 1903 · A. C. McClurg
Book
Why it matters
Essays introducing double consciousness and the colour line, including the chapter on the death of Du Bois's infant son. Public domain.
Relationship to Black men
About Black men; By Black man
Identity basis. Author identity publicly documented
Details
Sociology
Open access
The Trouble With Black Boys: And Other Reflections on Race, Equity, and the Future of Public Education
Noguera, Pedro A. · 2008 · Jossey-Bass
Book
Why it matters
Essays on why schools fail Black boys and what interventions have measurable effect. Standard reading in teacher preparation.
Relationship to Black men
About Black men
Details
Education
Print or licensed
Citation
Noguera, Pedro A.. The Trouble With Black Boys: And Other Reflections on Race, Equity, and the Future of Public Education. Jossey-Bass, 2008.
We Real Cool: Black Men and Masculinity
hooks, bell · 2004 · Routledge
Book
Why it matters
A short, argumentative study of how patriarchy and white supremacy together shape the emotional lives of Black men. Written for a general readership and widely assigned as an entry point to Black masculinity studies.
Relationship to Black men
About Black men
Details
Cultural studies
Print or licensed
Scope, method and what is missing
This is a working bibliography, not a census. It documents books and dissertations by Black men, works about Black men and boys, and the scholarship of Black Men's Studies — manhood, masculinities, health, education, family, incarceration, labour, culture and intellectual life. Cataloguing every work ever written by a Black man is not a coherent task; foregrounding works that take Black men's lives as their subject is.
On identity. The category “by a Black man” is never assigned from a name, a photograph, an institutional affiliation or a subject. It is recorded only where there is a documented basis — the author's own description, an authorised biography, a publisher or institutional profile, or a vetted authority record — and that basis is printed on the record. Where no source supports it, the field is left empty rather than guessed. 24 of the 34 records shown here carry a documented identity basis.
On verification. Every record says how far it has been checked. Works marked “seed: confirm against catalogue record” were entered from established bibliographic knowledge and still need checking against a library catalogue or publisher page. Dissertations drawn from a supplied bibliography are marked for confirmation against the awarding university's own repository, because a dissertation title circulating in a list is not the same as a dissertation record held by the institution that granted the degree.
Known gaps. The collection is presently United States-centred and anglophone. Caribbean, African, Black British, Francophone and Latin American scholarship on Black men is barely represented, as is work on Black disabled men, Black immigrant men and Black LGBTQ+ men. Self-published and community-published works — a substantial part of this literature, and the part libraries collect least — are underrepresented. These absences are recorded here as data rather than left for a reader to discover.
Know a work that belongs here?
Send the full citation and one stable link — a repository record, catalogue entry, DOI or publisher page. Dissertations, community-published books and non-U.S. scholarship are especially wanted.