9 Books Published by Universal Write Publications on AALBC — Book Cover Collage

“If there’s anything that has prevented human beings from being human beings, then it is the discourse of racist ideas. Being Human Being cogently and clearly reveals the illusion, disruption, and distraction of racist ideas, which have left people conceptually stranded from the fullness of humanity. And this moving book goes a step further. Molefi Kete Asante and Nah Dove return us to the ancient idea of Ma’at-thus returning us to humanity.”
—Ibram X. Kendi, PhD, Andrew W. Mellon Professor in the Humanities,
Professor of History, Boston University

During a time of high racial tension, Being Human Being seeks to dispel divisiveness, and instead present a vision of a united humanity. With scientific basis established from The Human Genome Project, the authors explore what it means to be human, the myth of race, and the importance of common identity. The conclusions of the Human Genome Project discredit those who deny humanity’s genesis on the African continent; and, they allow for new examination of the fictitious basis upon which modern society justifies its divisions, privileges, and punishments. In this book, the discourse navigates the complex illusion of race by tracing its cultural and religious origins. Furthering the ideas brought forth in Ibram X. Kendi’s critically acclaimed book How to Be An Antiracist, the authors express the power in ending the language of race entirely, bringing forth a new era in which racism no longer plagues the human experience. With in depth evidence surrounding the colloquial misuse of the term "race," Being Human Being argues that the term human, robust and newly re-envisioned, eradicates the need for the illusion of categorical racial boundaries. The authors, in their acknowledgement of the differences that exist among humans, found that such distinctions are more easily explained culturally rather than "racially." Even so, habitual reference to these racial partitions are ingrained into many aspects of the contemporary landscape. Knowing this, Being Human Being addresses the challenges of exchanging race for humanity within mainstream media, academic circles, and pop culture.

Being Human Being depicts the importance of education in combating those who benefit from, and promote, racism. Educating the masses would allow multicultural, pluralistic societies to be achieved in a practical way. The authors suggest that humanity is hindered by its disunity, and that through concepts like Ma’aticity, the ancient way of becoming human, society can achieve its highest potential. Featuring an array of examples, illustrations, and theoretical models, Being Human Being demonstrates that the only race is the human race.

Radical Insurgencies draws and translates wisdom from Africology, history, sociology, and philosophy to stitch together various social and political concerns presented by Asante in various academic settings. The book offers selected portions of significant speeches, an adaptation from the author’s The American Demagogue, and a selection of conference papers presented in British Columbia, Zimbabwe, and the Chinese Communication Conference in 2011.

What is a person to do with the pain, anger, fear, frustration and dismay of Black defamation and demise due to White supremacy’s racism and anti-Blackness? Even more, how does one celebrate the triumph of surviving and escaping enslavement, establishing civil rights, creating and promulgating renaissance after renaissance as social movements while inspiring the world to take note? Wonder no more. Dr. Molefi K. Asante has eloquently penned an emotional spectrum of poems truly reflecting the spirit, soul, and humanity of Black people in 400 Years of Witnessing: A Memoir of a People 1619-2019.

The substantive and meaningful reflections on and about Black life and the social conditions it has encountered and often endured over 400 years fosters a compelling need for readers to journey page-by-page through each poem. With effortless ease to read, Dr. Asante weaves a tapestry of Black strength, vulnerability, and resolve unlike any other collection of Black poetic expressions through what is likely to become a literary favorite though the brilliance of 400 Years of Witnessing: A Memoir of a People 1619-2019.

Demagogues act as if they have a right to rule not as Plato’s philosopher kings but, in a twisted perversion, because of their supposed higher intelligence. And yet, in the case of Donald Trump, there is little evidence that he has a liberal education or a broad understanding of the contemporary world. Trump neither reads deeply nor is he willing to be taught by those who do read seriously.

Given that Adolf Hitler openly preached anti-Semitism and believed in the superiority of the German people, what does it mean that the people could see him as a leader? For him, there was nothing wrong with the German society except it had opened itself up to an "invasion" of non-German people. The idea was to create and maintain a purely German state with people who had German blood.

The American Demagogue provides historical records and proof of hatred that gave rise to Donald Trump and highlights why it is crucial to interpret the guideposts history offers, such as how genocide, xenophobia, and misogynistic ideas dominate.

These authors, all deeply dedicated to the telling of an African story, are committed to righting the wrongs of intellectual inquiry by setting upright the standards, criteria, and assumptions often avoided by Eurocentrists-of any complexion. Without the ’lions of Africa’ speaking and writing about their narratives, the fields of literature, philosophy, social science, history, and psychology, evidence would cede to those without the slightest idea about the African knowledge base or how to add to it. Thus, the authors in this volume speak loudly, and write deftly and definitively to erect a new phalanx of liberated minds.

Readers will learn how:

• Black people of the African Diaspora have a story that transcends Eurocentric teachings and ideology.
• The intricate knowledge of history, physical, and social sciences are rich in the scholarship of Black educators.
• To navigate the spaces of socio-political concepts by shedding new light and thinking strategy.
• The stories are different when the lions are not the victims but can display agency in the hunt and hunted.

The authors in this book logically state the cultural, social, economic, political, and literary facts regarding African people and explore what Africans have said-and will say.

Revolutionary Pedagogy: Primer for Teachers of Black Children is a passionate appeal to teachers to take what George Dei calls a "transgressive" position toward education’s status quo, a status quo often expressed as a commitment to excellence of all students. This book offers tools for those who want to reverse the brain freeze that often accompanies this seemingly innocuous goal, assisting both the students and the teachers laboring in urban situations.

Readers will learn how and what to use to:

• Create revolutionary pedagogy
• Provide students the opportunity to study the world, its people, concepts, and history from the point of view of the African child’s heritage
• Identify the three critical challenges to white supremacist teachings
• Correct distorted information
• Recognize dysconscious racism
• Re-center dislocated African American students and expand the knowledge of all other students in the classroom

Revolutionary Pedagogy: Primer for Teachers of Black Children gives teachers the best tools possible to unlock the potential in (all) children sitting in their classroom.

From religion to love, slavery to freedom, language is a powerful tool. We use words to identify, express, impose and create movements, overthrow governments, topple dictators and impart knowledge. It is no surprise then that the news media, schools, and religious institutions can use words, images, symbols, music, art, and stories, to either keep people subjugated or break the chains of mental, emotional, and psychological imprisonment.

Afrocentric Before Afrocentricity: A Quest Towards Endarkenment analyzes the power of language as a tool of communication, as a process of evolution and as plank to walk in the realization of who you are and where you belong. Afrocentric Before Afrocentricity unfolds as a chronological journey, that especially through the most recent pieces, applies the Afrocentricity paradigm, movements such as Pan-Africanism, and theories such as Corpus Linguistics to assert a counter narrative to discrimination. These pieces debunk linguistic imperialistic ideologies, and through poetic prose, offer a small way to limit the etymological assault on the erosion of Black consciousness.

Molefi Kete Asante argues that the infamous historical acts of lynching black men in the United States might be used to describe how many people of the white Right Wing have used various techniques to "string up" presidential objectives. Barack Obama as the first black President of the United States met immediate resistance from a white majority that voted for his opponent in 2008. This was repeated in 2012.

Asante contends that whites felt that they had lost "their" country and the only way to act was to prevent Barack Obama from asserting himself as a black man. Asante shows in a compelling manner, by choosing many of the attacks on Obama found in the media, that the President was tied up, roped, and hung out to dry by the white Republican Right. Nevertheless, as Asante explains Barack Obama championed some of the most progressive actions ever addressed by a president.

In this volume Asante has sought to provide the formal and informal student with the structure for critical reflections on significant issues in the African world. Thus, African Pyramids is as much a methodological as theoretical work.

Molefi Kete Asante has been named by his peers as one of the most influential contemporary scholars in America. In fact, Maulana Karenga said,"Molefi is the preeminent Afrocentric theorist, an intellectual of the highest caliber, and a fine human being." Michael Dyson has written that, "The pioneering Afrocentrist Molefi Kete Asante is one of the most influential African American scholars." Asante’s contribution to scholarship appears in his own work, the work of his mentored students, and the critical scholarship engendered by his provocative philosophical approach to the study of Africa and its Diaspora. He writes history, novels, short stories, essays, plays, critical commentary, and poetry.

Asante has directed more than 120 doctoral students and his students lead departments and teach at universities across the world. Professor Asante received his PhD from the University of California, Los Angeles and has taught at UCLA, Purdue, SUNY-Buffalo, Florida State, Howard, and Temple University. Asante is a Visiting Professor at Zhejiang University in Hangzhou, China, and Professor Extraordinarius at the University of South Africa. He is currently Professor and Chair, Department of Africology, Temple University. Asante has published 78 (seventy-eight) books, including the comprehensive The History of Africa. African Pyramids of Knowledge represents a synthesis of Asante’s most powerful arguments for the overturn of a Eurocentric consciousness that prevents African people from exercising their own agency based on their fundamental cultural values.