Archive - History of Black Writing Blog
The Banner image for the HBW Blog, which was published from 2011-2021.
Black Literary History Making
The HBW Blog published regularly for ten years from 2011-2021 at the URL https://projecthbw.ku.edu. During that time, it served as a major forum for the exchange of information and ideas, as well as a robust network for scholars, teachers, and students from different disciplines around the world.
Guest contributors include leading scholars and writers, but most of the posts were conceived of, researched, and written by HBW's staff of undergraduate and graduate students. Its content consists of feature editorials, book reviews, memorials, and coverage of HBW programming. Altogether, 95 writers contributed more than 750 posts.
The HBW Blog Archive is searchable by topic, month and year, and contributor name.
| Blog Post/Link | Date |
|---|---|
| VoiceThread: The Color Purple The visual reception and relationship between a particular book cover and the content of that novel plays a significant role in how larger audience regard the social context of a particular work. Specifically, Alice Walker’s 1982 novel The Color Purple has been a film, a radio broadcast mini-series in Britain as well as a Broadway musical. Certainly, the various iterations of The Color Purple as a novel covers and movie create distinct impressions about the work and Walker.. | |
| Oprah Winfrey–A Sponsor of Black Artistic Culture Oprah Winfrey’s role in expanding the readership of African American literature and promoting the work of black novelists serves as a point of entry for better understanding how well-known and lesser-known writers gain exposure to commercial audiences. .. | |
| Break It Down: Apex Hides the Hurt “Break It Down” is a HBW Literary Blog initiative that strives to offer critical interpretations of song lyrics, excerpts from novels, and poems. .. | |
| Break It Down: Go Tell It on the Mountain “Break It Down” is a HBW Literary Blog initiative that strives to offer critical interpretations of song lyrics, excerpts from novels, and poems. .. | |
| Break It Down: Invisible Man “Break It Down” is a HBW Literary Blog initiative that strives to offer critical interpretations of song lyrics, excerpts from novels, and poems. .. | |
| Break It Down: Song of Solomon “Break It Down” is a HBW Literary Blog initiative that strives to offer critical interpretations of song lyrics, excerpts from novels, and poems. .. | |
| Oprah Winfrey and The Color Purple Since her debut acting role in the 1985 Steven Spielberg directed film, based on Alice Walker’s 1983 novel, Oprah Winfrey’s involvement movie adaption of novels has been active. She has served as both an actress and producer. Similar to her involvement with Morrison’s works, Winfrey’s has demonstrated an extended connection to The Color Purple... | |
| Oprah’s Book Club and Toni Morrison “Oprah’s Book Club” contributed greatly to helping well-known and lesser-known black writers gain exposure to mainstream reading audiences. Founded in September 1996, Winfrey’s book club ran until December 2010, and several different writers were featured on her talk show to discuss the selected texts. Four of Toni Morrison’s novels were featured as selections in the book club. Morrison’s sales, as a result, increased substantially. More significantly, Morrison’s exposure to wider audiences increased... | |
| Timeline: Oprah Winfrey and African-American Literature 1985 — Winfrey plays the role of Sofia in the film The Color Purple based on Alice Walker’s 1982 novel... | |
| 95 Dates of Importance in African American Novel History 1852– The Heroic Slave, a novella by Frederick Douglass, is published in 1852 by John P. Jewett and Company. The novella resembles a slave narrative even though it is a work of fiction. .. |