“From slave work songs and spirituals to ragtime, blues, jazz, soul, funk, gospel, and hip-hop, African Americans have used music as an instrument for social and political change….  

However, African American music speaks of much more than racial injustice and historical suffering. Black music has profoundly inspired each era of sociopolitical upheaval and artistic development in American culture. Whereas black history is sometimes represented as a long cycle of struggle and degradation, African American music reveals strategies black people have used to resist injustice, preserve historical memory, celebrate self-worth, and exert powerful influence over our sense of American national identity.”

• Alexia Williams, 2018

TODAY’S PRACTICE: Listen to music of your choosing (see the Liberation Calendar playlist). (optional) Watch this video on the history of gospel music in Chicago.

DAILY REFLECTION: Which genres of Black music have you explored? Which unexplored genres would you like to get to know?

TAKE ACTION: Uplift a photo of yourself with a banned book that changed your life (post with #freedomtolearn).