All tagged american civil rights
Sharon McMahon (pronounced McMan) made a name for herself as “America’s Civics Teacher” over the course of the last decade. A high school social studies teacher, she is very knowledgeable about American history and government (and the process of relaying that information to others); for years she has been sharing her passion and knowledge with anyone interested in following from her @sharonsaysso account on Instagram. She also has a very active Substack account. Last year she published her first book: The Small and the Mighty: Twelve Unsung Americans Who Changed America, from the Founding to the Civil Rights Movement (2024). The timing couldn’t have been better. This nonfiction book highlights the lives and actions of twelve Americans from our country’s inception to the Civil Rights movement who may not be well known, but whose impact was real. Indeed, The Small and the Mighty is the inspiring history lesson many of us crave of late. Its biographies capture the spirit of democracy and freedom for all that many treasure as core American values.
So often writers tease out an elaborate story by asking a series of compelling what-ifs. In the case of Percival Everett’s most recent novel, James (2024), this is certainly the case. Everett spins an alternate history of American slavery that draws the reader in and provokes readers to reconsider certain narratives. Because, what if? James is the tale of the enslaved man readers met a century ago in Mark Twain’s Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, but Everett’s Jim is far more complicated and dynamic than his literary debut (à la Twain) depicted.
Marilynne Robinson’s Home (2008) is the story of a family with a son whose sorted past and heavy heart, continue to define and limit him well into middle age. As his father—“Reverend” to even his sons— faces the final journey after a long and upstanding life, Jack returns home to the town of Gilead, Iowa to face his inner demons and the setting for his earliest shame. This novel tells the story of his return, reception, and renewal. Robinson writes this novel, the second of four in the Gilead series, alternating close third-person perspectives between Jack, the wayward son, and his youngest sister Glory.
