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Google has created a Doodle to celebrate Frederick Douglass’ 198th Birthday. He  was a social reformer, abolitionist, orator and writer.

Here’s more from the Google Doodle webpage: “To help us commemorate Frederick Douglass’s legacy, the Gilder Lehman Institute curated an exhibit of photographs and ephemera that you can explore here. Through our partnership with Open Road Integrated Media, Google Play Books is offering a free download of Douglass’s seminal autobiography, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass: an American Slave, which is available starting today, February 1, 2016.”

In the past, Google has crafted Doodles in honor of Little House series author Laura Ingalls Wilder, Where the Wild Things Are creator Maurice Sendak, and Anne of Green Gables novelist Lucy Maud Montgomery. Here’s a video from Google headquarters spotlighting the artists behind the doodles. Which authors would you suggest as future Doodle subjects? (via The Huffington Post)

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In 1861, just prior to the American Civil War, Harriet Jacobs published a famous slave narrative – of her life in slavery and her arduous escape. Two years earlier, in 1859, Harriet Wilson published an autobiographical novel, Our Nig; or, Sketches from the Life of a Free Black, tracing her life as “free black” farm servant in New England.

The post Harriet Jacobs: the life of a slave girl appeared first on OUPblog.

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VICE has launched a new literary series called ​”Behind the Bars: Guantá​namo Bay, Stories From the World’s Most Notorious Prison.” The editors behind this series have posted recipes, essays, poems, satire pieces, a fable. One of the sections in this series explores the books that may have been banned from the prison library.

According to the editor’s letter, an assortment of writers, scholars, and public figures have been brought on to examine “the list of books that are reportedly banned from GTMO—including their own—and tried to figure out why.” Some of the titles that can’t be accessed at this institution include The Merchant of Venice by William Shakespeare, An American Slave by Frederick Douglass, and The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank. The New Yorker staffer Ariel Levy looked into Frank’s famous Holocaust memoir; here’s an excerpt from her article:

“The starkest difference between the captivity of Anne Frank and those in Guantánamo Bay is that Anne Frank and her family were in hiding. It must be so surreal for those in Gitmo to know that the whole world knows they’re there. We all know and it doesn’t seem to matter. Anne and her family’s whole plight is to remain invisible, to remain secret. In that sense it’s confounding that the book is banned at Guantánamo—the family couldn’t be making any less trouble. What more could you want from a prisoner than invisibility and silence?”

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Each summer, Oxford University Press USA and Bryant Park in New York City partner for their summer reading series Word for Word Book Club. The Bryant Park Reading Room offers free copies of book club selections while supply lasts, compliments of Oxford University Press, and guest speakers lead the group in discussion. On Tuesday 19 August 2014, Garnette Cadogan, freelance writer and co-editor of the forthcoming Oxford Handbook of the Harlem Renaissance, leads a discussion on Frederick Douglass’s Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave.

What was your inspiration for working on the Oxford Handbook of the Harlem Renaissance?

I kept encountering the influence of the Harlem Renaissance — on art, music, literature, dance, and politics, among other spheres – and longed for a fresh, interesting discussion of the Renaissance in its splendid variety. My close friend and colleague Shirley Thompson, who teaches at UT-Austin, often discussed with me the enormous accomplishments and rich legacies of that movement. So, when she invited me to help her bring together myriad voices to talk about central cultural, intellectual, and political figures and ideas of the Harlem Renaissance, I, of course, gleefully joined her to arrange The Oxford Handbook of the Harlem Renaissance.

Where do you do your best writing?

On the kitchen counter. The comfort of the kitchen is like nowhere else, nothing else. (Look where everyone gathers at your next house party). To boot, nothing gets my mind revving like cooking. I’ll often run from skillet to keyboard shouting “Yes!”

Did you have an “a-ha!” moment that made you want to be a writer?

No one moment — it was a multitude of taps, then a grab — but having one of my professors in college call me to ask that I read my final paper to him over the phone was a big motivator. I took it as encouragement to be a writer, though, in retrospect, I recognize that it was my strange accent and not my prose style that was the appeal.

Which author do you wish had been your 7th grade English teacher?

Someone who could handle the distractible, chatterbox me, the troublemaker who had absolutely no interest in books or learning. Someone with a love for books who led a fascinating life and could tell a good story. Why, yes, George Orwell — What a remarkable life! What remarkable work! — would hold my attention and interest.

What is your secret talent?

Remarkably creative procrastination, coupled with the ability to trick myself that I’m not procrastinating. (Sadly, no one else but me is fooled.)

What is your favorite book?

Wait, what day is it? It all depends on the day you ask me. Sometimes, even the time of day you ask. Right now, it’s The Poems of Emily Dickinson (the handsome, authoritative edition edited by R.W. Franklin). I stand by this decision for another forty-eight hours.

Who reads your first draft?

Two friends who possess the right balance of grace and brutal honesty, the journalists Eve Fairbanks and Ilan Greenberg. They know just how to knock down and lift up, especially Eve, who has almost supernatural discernment and knows exactly what to say — and, more important in the early stages, what not to say. But who really gets the first draft are my friends John Wilson, the affable sage who edits Books and Culture, and John Freeman, whose eagle eye used to edit Granta; I verbally unload on them my fugitive ideas trying to assemble into a story (poor fellas), and then wait for red, yellow, green, or detour. Without this quartet, everything I write reads like the journal entries of Cookie Monster.

Do you read your books after they’ve been published?

My books haven’t been published yet, but I imagine that I’ll treat them like the rest of my writing: mental detritus I avoid looking at. I’m cursed with a near-pathological ability to only see what’s wrong with my writing.

Do you prefer writing on a computer or longhand?

Painful as it is to transcribe my hieroglyphics from writing pads (or concert programs and restaurant napkins), I prefer writing longhand. My second-guessing, severe, demanding, judgmental inner-editor makes it so. On a laptop, it’s cut this, change that, insert who-knows-what, and at day’s end I’m behind where I began. And yet, I never learn. I still do most of my writing on a computer.

What book are you currently reading? (And is it in print or on an e-Reader?)

I own two e-readers but never use them; I get too much enjoyment from the tactile pleasures of bound paper. I’m now reading a riveting, touching account of the thirty-three miners trapped underground in Chile four years ago, Hector Tobar’s Deep Down Dark, which is much more than the story of their survival. It’s also a story about faith and family and perseverance. Emily St. John’s novel Station Eleven is another book that intriguingly explores survival and belief and belonging. And art and culture, too. It’s partially set in a post-apocalyptic era, but without the clichés and cloying, overplayed scenarios that come with that setting. And I’ve been regularly dipping into Michael Robbins’ new book of poems, The Second Sex — smart, smart-alecky, “sonicky,” vibrantly awake to sound and meaning — not because he’s a friend, but because he’s oh-so-good. I’ll be pressing all three books on everyone I know that can read.

What word or punctuation mark are you most guilty of overusing?

The em-dash — since it allows my sentences to breathe much easier once it’s around. It’s so forgiving, too — I get to clear my throat and then be garrulous, and readers will put up with me trying have it both ways. The em-dash is both chaperone and wingman; which other punctuation mark can make that boast? Plus, it’s a looker — bold and purposeful and lean.

If you weren’t a writer, what would you be?

Something that takes me outdoors — and in the streets — as much as possible. Anything that doesn’t require sitting at a desk with my own boring thoughts for hours. And where I get to meet lots of new people. Bike messenger, perhaps.

Image credits: (1) Bryant Park, New York. Photo by cerfon. CC BY-NC-SA 2.0 via cerfon Flickr. (2) Garnette Cadogan. Photo by Bart Babinski. Courtesy of Garnette Cadogan.

The post 10 questions for Garnette Cadogan appeared first on OUPblog.

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Black History Month 2013 commemorates two significant events in American History, the 150th anniversary of the 1863 Emancipation Proclamation, and the 50th Anniversary of the 1963 March on Washington, D.C. and Dr.Martin Luther King, Jr.’s I Have a Dream speech.

Black History Month began in 1926, largely through the efforts of Dr. Carter G. Woodson.  February was selected because it is in February that we celebrate the birthdays of two great men, President Abraham Lincoln and Abolitionist Frederick Douglass. An interesting project is the Abraham Lincoln Historical Digitization Project by Northern Illinois University. Also, you might want to check out Stanford University’s The Martin Luther King, Jr. Research and Education Institute.

Books of interest compiled by Mary Schulte of the Kansas City Star:

• I, Too, Am America by Langston Hughes, illustrated by Bryan Collier
• Skit-Scat Raggedy Cat: Ella Fitzgerald by Roxane Orgill, illustrated by Sean Qualls
• Desmond and the Very Mean Word by Archbishop Desmond Tutu and Douglas Carlton Abrams, illustrated by A. G. Ford
• H.O.R.S.E.: A Game of Basketball and Imagination by Christopher Myers
• The Mighty Miss Malone by Christopher Paul Curtis
• Courage Has No Color, The True Story of the Triple Nickles, America’s First Black Paratroopers by Tanya Lee Stone
• I Have a Dream by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., paintings by Kadir Nelson
• A Splash of Red, the Life and Art of Horace Pippin by Jen Bryant
• Unspoken, A Story from the Underground Railroad by Henry Cole
• Hand in Hand: Ten Black Men Who Changed America by Andreas Davis Pinkney, illustrated by Brian Pinkney

Related Articles:

• Abraham Lincoln, 1809-1865 (SSPP Reads 02/04/2009)
• February, Black History Month (SSPP Reads 02/11/2009)
• Black History Month, 2010 (SSPP Reads 02/10/2010)
• The Meaning and Making of Emancipation (eBook available from the National Archives)

Graphic from Perris Valley Historical & Museum Association, Perris CA

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"Frederick Douglass appealing to President Lincoln and his cabinet to enlist Negroes," mural by William Edouard Scott, at the Recorder of Deeds building, built in 1943.  Highsmith, Carol M., 1946-, photographer

Last year, I reviewed a copy of Russell Freedman's, Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass: The Story Behind an American Friendship (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2012).  The story of their friendship and the "back story," was so interesting, that I thought it might make a good topic for a Black History Month program for younger children.  I began searching for a way to communicate to a young library audience the connection between the history of African Americans and these two great men. In researching, I found that the founder of African American History Month (it was originally called Negro History Week), Dr. Carter G. Woodson, initiated this cultural celebration in 1926, and chose February because the birthdays of Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass are both celebrated in February. (1)   I then discovered an earlier book, Lincoln and Douglass: An American Friendship (Henry Holt, 2008), that recounts the friendship but targets a younger audience.  Even better, it has a companion DVD.  So, I planned a Lincoln and Douglass birthday celebration, featuring the Lincoln and Douglass picture book and an explanation of the founding of Black History Month. Perfect, right?

Well, not quite.  In reading Lincoln and Douglass: An American Friendship, I found several discrepancies.  As it turns out, the timeline included in the picture book's back matter is correct, but some dates within the book's narrative are not. For example, Freedman's thoroughly researched book has the initial meeting of Lincoln and Douglass as a central theme. The picture book gets the date wrong.  Though the picture book still has merit and will be useful to introduce Douglass and Lincoln to a young audience, I can also use it as a teaching moment.  Always check to see that a book has been properly researched if you plan to use it as a representation of factual material.

Oddly, the same thing happened to me last year.  I sketch out my programs many months in advance to satisfy printing and publicity deadlines.  I fill the details in later.  Last year, I offered a Black History Month program on Follow the Drinking Gourd (Knopf, 1988).  While investigating resources, I found that the story, while well-known and generally accepted, is more folk legend than truth. (2)  Again, the story is not without merit and I was again able to use it as a teaching moment.  Besides the obvious lesson, we looked at ways in which to read the stars without a compass.

I understand narrative license.  I understand that it's particularly useful in treatments of difficult topics for younger children.  I also understand, however, that there is a concerted effort by our nation's leaders to raise a new generation of critical thinkers, and to achieve that end, the use of nonfiction books will rise dramatically.  It is up to us as librarians, teachers, caregivers and parents to discern fact from fiction, even when the line between them may be indistinct.  In doing so, we will help children to navigate a world where information is everywhere for the taking, but truth must be mined.



Today's Nonfiction Monday roundup is at Apples with Many Seeds.

And don't forget, February is a perfect time to head over to The Brown Bookshelf; each day in February will feature a different artist in this annual celebration of Black History Month and children's literature.







(1) Library of Congress, "African American History Month"http://www.loc.gov/law/help/commemorative-observations/african-american.php (Douglass' actual birthdate is not known conclusively)
(2) Follow the Drinking Gourd
http://www.followthedrinkinggourd.org/

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Today I have the pleasure of featuring Nancy Sanders and her newest book Frederick Douglass for Kids: His Life and Times with 21 Activities.

Nancy is an amazing author of over 75 published books - see what I mean about being amazing.

Okay, let's get into it.

Featured Book:
Frederick Douglass for Kids: His Life and Times with 21 Activities
By Nancy I. Sanders
Author’s site: www.nancyisanders.com
Book’s site: www.FrederickDouglass.wordpress.com
Purchase the book on Amazon at: http://tinyurl.com/7opjcn4

Book Synopsis
Few Americans have had as much impact on this nation as Frederick Douglass. Born on a plantation, he later escaped slavery and helped others to freedom via the Underground Railroad. In time he became a bestselling author, an outspoken newspaper editor, a brilliant orator, a tireless abolitionist, and a brave civil rights leader. He was famous on both sides of the Atlantic in the years leading up to the Civil War, and when war broke out, Abraham Lincoln invited him to the White House for counsel and advice.
   
Frederick Douglass for Kids follows the footsteps of this American hero, from his birth into slavery to his becoming a friend and confidant of presidents and the leading African American of his day. And to better appreciate Frederick Douglass and his times, readers will form a debating club, cook a meal similar to the one Douglass shared with John Brown, make a civil war haversack, participate in a microlending program, and more. This valuable resource also includes a time line of significant events, a list of historic sites to visit or explore online, and web resources for further study.

INTERVIEW WITH THE AUTHOR

Tradebook Tips for Teachers from Children’s Author Nancy I. Sanders

Is this book suitable for classroom use?
Frederick Douglass for Kids is a great classroom resource in elementary, middle school, and high school classes on U.S. History! It’s the perfect tool for studying about the life and times of Frederick Douglass, abolitionists, the Civil War, and early civil rights leaders. It includes short biographies of key black leaders during the years before the Civil War. Its timeline of the influence of black troops during the Civil War features information never before found altogether in a children’s book. It takes facts typically only studied at the university level on this topic and presents them in a student-friendly format. It presents the life of this true American hero, Frederick Douglass, in an inspirational way to motivate students to take a stand for what they believe it and make a difference in their world just as Douglass did.

Are there any teaching resources available for use with this book?
I also write teaching resource books for Scholastic Teaching Resources, so I designed a teacher’s study guide to use with this book. These worksheets include chapter-by-chapter evaluation questions, a Civil War letter to write, a Venn Diagram to compare and contrast the life of Frederick Douglass with Martin Luther King Jr., and more! You’ll find these free worksheets to download and print on the book’s website at:
www.frederickdouglass.wordpress.com/teachers-and-librarians/

I also designed a set of printable bookmarks to distribute to your stu

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Freedman, Russell. 2012. Abraham Lincoln & Frederick Douglass: The Story Behind an American Friendship. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

The date is August 10, 1863. Frederick Douglass has arrived at the White House, taking a seat on the stairs, determined to speak with President Lincoln.  Many others are waiting as well.  Douglass stands out in the crowd, not just for his size.  All the other petitioners are White.  Douglass, a freed Black is an outspoken critic of Lincoln.  The two men have never met.  Douglass has no appointment.  He is prepared to wait.

He does not wait long, however.  The President does see Frederick Douglass on August 10, 1863; and in Abraham Lincoln & Frederick Douglass: The Story Behind an American Friendship, award-winning author, Russell Freedman tells us why.

Freedman is a master writer, and ingeniously sets up this story of friendship. Chapter One, "Waiting for Mr. Lincoln," sets the stage.  The next three chapters detail the life of Frederick Douglass before his meeting with Lincoln.  Three subsequent chapters do the same for the President.  The final three chapters highlight the collaboration of the two men in pursuit of their mutual interest, abolition.

The extensive use of period photographs and artwork, as well as images of period realia (election poster, paycheck, editorial cartoons and the like) add interest to an already compelling story.  The depth of Lincoln's regard for Douglass is cemented by the revelation that Mary Todd Lincoln sent Douglass a memento after Lincoln's death, knowing that Lincoln had "wanted to do something to express his warm personal regard" for Douglass.

Appendix: Dialogue Between a Master and Slave, Historic Sites, Selected Bibliography, Notes (on the sources of more than one hundred quotes) and Picture Credits (including many from the Newbery Medal-winning Russell Freedman book, Lincoln: A Photobiography) round out this extensively researched book.

The Contents page indicates an Index beginning on page 115, however, it was apparently not completed in time for the printing of the Advance Reading Copies.

Abraham Lincoln & Frederick Douglas is suggested for Grades 4-7, and is due on shelves June 19, 2012.  It is a fascinating look at two of the most influential men of their time by one of the great children's authors of our time.  Highly recommended.

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Last fall, some of the staff at Lee & Low wanted to find out what it was like to walk twelve miles. Why? We were inspired by the feat that Frederick Douglass’ mother accomplishes in Love Twelve Miles Long by Glenda Armand and Colin Bootman: she walks twelve miles by night to visit her son. As happened often with slave families, Frederick was separated from her at birth and sent to live on another plantation, so this was the only way that he was going to be able to see her.

So, one brisk November morning, four of us met near Wall Street to begin a journey that would take us all day. Honestly, the longer that the trip took, the more we realized what an incredibly daunting task this actually was. When we started the walk, we figured it would take a few hours, but imagined that we would be back in the office in time for a well-deserved lunch.

Ha. After actually walking the amazing distance, we realized how much we overestimated our own abilities, and how much we underestimated the immense display of love that Harriet Bailey performed for her son. Coming to this realization, it made me think about how much effort we must sometimes put into seeing those that we love. There are so many reasons why parents might have to be separated from their children for a period of time, or spouses from each other, or siblings. Even today, work, school, or other family obligations can lead to months or years apart. However, it’s the effort that we put in to keep those relationships strong that really impacts them. Douglass mentioned how his mother impacted him, even though he was not able to spend much time with her. These late night visits kept her in his heart and helped to mold him into the great leader that he became.

The walk brought up so many other things to consider as well (we had a long way to go, and a lot to think about). For instance, the convenience of transportation. Not only would Harriet not have taxis, buses, or a subway in the 1800s, but it would take over a century until African Americans were legally permitted to use them without any restriction.

Harriet also worked in the fields all day before taking this walk. And she had to walk all the way back. I pretty much stayed off of my feet the entire evening afterwards, and didn’t move much the next day. The fact that Harriet could work all day at hard labor, walk twelve miles to see her son for just a short time before walking twelve miles back to work again the next day, shows the amazing power of love. This is something that we can often forget when caught up in the turmoil of the world at large. But as long as there is love, there is hope.

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As February comes to an end, people who have already read The Autobiography of Malcolm X and My Bondage and My Freedom might need more book suggestions for Black History Month. Bluewater Productions has released a comic collection called Black History: Leaders to celebrate.

Here’s more from the press release: “The 96-page anthology includes the unabridged issues featuring Barack Obama, Colin Powell, Oprah Winfrey, and Condoleezza Rice. These biographies were previously published as individual issues of Bluewater’s biographical comic titles Female Force and Political Power.”

Flashlight Worthy released a book list by Denise Fawcett Facey entitled: “Books About African Americans That Aren’t Just for Black History Month.” Below, we’ve recommended more titles. What books are you reading to celebrate Black History Month?

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