Black genius : essays on an American legacy / by Tre Johnson.

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

A powerful read redefining the meaning of genius while illuminating the ways in which Black Americans have found various ways to thrive despite insurmountable obstacles.

Black genius sits at the heart of the American story. In his probing essay collection, Black Genius , cultural critic Tre Johnson examines how Black American culture has, against all odds, been the lifeblood of American ingenuity. At times using his own personal and professional stories, Johnson surveys Black cities, communities, and schools with an ever-watchful eye of what transpires around Black mobility.

With a passion for complex storytelling and pulling from both pop culture and American history, Johnson weaves past and present making his case for the genius of innovation. As he examined his findings, Johnson couldn't help but wonder about the brilliance of the every day. Specifically, the creativity of the 90's graffiti-style airbrush tee, his aunties packed weekend bus trips to Atlantic city, and the razor-tongued, socially-sharp, profanity-laced monologues of comedian Dick Gregory.

Again and again, he asks us to ponder--are these not obvious examples of genius?

Chatty yet profound, Black Genius subverts expectations from the very first page with a blend of reportage, historical data, and pop culture as Johnson dives into his own family history seeking big answers to complex questions. Johnson's signature wit and curiosity turns history into an amusing sequence of events.

Table of contents provided by Syndetics

• Introduction (ix)
• Chapter 1 Your Best Bet Is All-Negro Comics!: Graphic Novels and Black Culture (3)
• Chapter 2 Streemal: Navigating America's Education (39)
• Chapter 3 Live Right, Do Right, Fight Like Hell: Family and Legacy (77)
• Chapter 4 The 5th Dimension: Celebration in America's Face (113)
• Chapter 5 What Doesn't Kill You Only Mutates and Tries Again: Performance in the Streets (139)
• Chapter 6 Agitate! Agitate!: Black Paranoia™ and Surveillance (173)
• Chapter 7 The Branch That Game Back: Communities and Neighborhood Transformation (205)
• Chapter 8 Vimeo Killed the Internet Star: Black Folks in the Digital Age (229)
• Chapter 9 The Imagined World: The Future Black World (261)
• Acknowledgments (287)

Reviews provided by Syndetics

Publishers Weekly Review

Cultural critic Johnson debuts with an astute and deeply felt essay collection on how Black Americans "leverage what might typically be seen as disadvantages--our marginalized, 'low' placement in society; our Blackness; our communities--and flip them into a series of superpowers." In "Streemal: Navigating America's Education," Johnson traces his uncle Alan's life from his youth in "Black Trenton" to college at UPenn in 1977 when the school only had 350 Black students. "The Fifth Dimension, Celebration in America's Face" is a memorable account of Philadelphia's "picturesque" Odunde festival, a yearly street fair in June replete with "Black cowboys strutting down South Philly blocks, a soundstage with throw-back R&B acts, the long bins of food, Black people fanning themselves," and more. Johnson deftly balances the celebratory, as in his account of the BlackStar Film Festival, which "transforms Philly's cultural spaces into an ephemeral Chocolate City," with harsh cultural realities, including the racial profiling that drives what he calls "Black Paranoia™," or "the historical and cultural state of having been relentlessly surveilled." Each essay is finely crafted as a standalone piece, and the thematic threads that run through the collection make it all the stronger when taken as a whole. It's an auspicious first outing from an unflinching voice. Agent: Sabrina Taitz, WME. (July)

Kirkus Book Review

A spirited presentation of the manifold accomplishments of Black creators as an instrument of resistance--and of love. "We're utterly amazing, yet Black folks are consistently, persistently, intentionally, conveniently, diabolically left out of conversations about genius all the time." So cultural critic and commentator Johnson observes at the outset of this collection of essays, returning to the theme at several points, as when he writes of sitting in a New Orleans restaurant where everything but the clientele was Black: "It all brought up the issues around appropriation, cultural extraction, gentrification and the sort of -dark‑humor irony of how often our music is good enough but we aren't." The author's humor is underscored with righteous indignation, as when he writes of going from a private church school where "as Black kids a lot of us thrived because we had a strong mixture of play, practice and positivity (prayer, too, obviously)" to a public middle school and high school where his abilities were constantly demeaned by white classmates and teachers--cause for his call to pay attention today to young Black students who "might've shown up with B or C grades but had A+ curiosity and social skills and the ability to think on their feet." Johnson celebrates the Black genius that society throttles through a wide range of examples, from comic books to music (with a lovely remembrance of the peace-and-love groove of the Fifth Dimension and even an understanding word or two for Kanye West) and from comic Dick Gregory toBlack Panther. Johnson even closes with a sort of Aquarian evocation of a Black community that is truly communal, one that can "afford opportunities to make choices in community with others and minimize some of the additional risks of trying and discovering things on your own," creating into the future in common cause. Readers will leave this provocative book wanting to hear much more from Johnson. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.