African American Parenting

When the men in their lives prove less than reliable, Savannah, Bernadine, Gloria, and Robin find new strength through a rare and enlightening friendship as they struggle to regain stability and an identity they don’t have to share with anyone. Because for the first time in a long time, their dreams are finally OFF hold....

If you are an honorary member of the Black Woman's Suffering Society, you have probably been told that it's all your fault. Or that struggling and suffering is your lot in life. Iyanla Vanzant says, "No!" Life is an act of faith and suffering is optional! Those everyday challenges, obstacles, and dilemmas are what Iyanla calls "valleys". As bad as they may seem, there is a purpose or, as Iyanla says, "There is so much value in the valley".

This recently rediscovered and critically acclaimed 1937 novel tells the story of Janie Crawford, a long-legged, articulate, and fiercely independent African-American woman of the 1930s. Janie's quest for identity includes three marriages and a return to her roots. Despite her struggles, Janie never defines herself by regret, fear, or unrealistic dreams, and refuses to be anything but her own person.

Do you feel like you're doing it all for everyone-all the time? This book offers mindful self-awareness practices to help you prioritize self-care, soothe stress, and create a life of joy, fulfillment, and well-being.

With her holistic approach to filling your life with comfort, balance, and peace, Debrena Jackson Gandy debunks society's myth that doing something for yourself is decadent and selfish. In fact, she says, the joy we gain from treating ourselves--whether to a luxuriant bath or to a meditative hour alone--is transferred to the people in our lives. When we emerge rejuvenated, others benefit from a patient mother, a fulfilled wife, an effective coworker, a solidly grounded friend.

What does it take to achieve your personal and professional goals? When is the right time to take calculated risks, and how do you prepare for the moment when opportunity presents itself? If anyone can show you how to do this, it’s Nicole Lynn. As the first Black female agent to represent a top-three NFL draft pick, Nicole worked her way from childhood poverty to become a Wall Street financial analyst, then attorney, and now top agent to elite athletes and entertainers.

Renowned as a diversity and inclusion strategist, Michelle Gadsden-Williams held C-Suite positions at major organizations for many years and then took the off-ramp to probe a different career path, launching Ceiling Breakers LLC, with the primary goal to help women and professionals of color reach their full potential. As a woman of color and corporate executive who has worked and traveled the world for several Fortune 500 companies - all while managing a chronic illness - she provides insight into overcoming the barriers facing professionals in today's workplace.

In her first book, The Presidency in Black and White, journalist April Ryan examined race in America through her experience as a White House reporter. In this book, she shifts the conversation from the White House to every home in America. At Mama's Knee looks at race and race relations through the lessons that mothers transmit to their children.

Black women face a hidden mental health crisis of anxiety and depression. To be a Black woman in America is to know that you cannot protect your children or guarantee their safety, that your value is consistently questioned, and that even being "twice as good" is often not good enough. Consequently, Black women disproportionately experience anxiety and depression. Studies now conclusively connect racism and mental health - and physical health. Time to take care of your emotional health. Because you deserve to be emotionally healthy for yourself and those you love.

New York Times best-selling, award-winning author, actor, and motivational speaker Hill Harper invites listeners to join the conversation about the breakdown of the African-American family. The black community of past generations found strength in families, but today’s black children have less than a one in three chance of being raised in a two-parent household. Harper’s search for answers to this phenomenon is an enlightening and empowering journey.

The fact is that millions of women in this country - no matter how varied their wants and needs - are itching to get their sexy back. Not a month goes by when there isn't some magazine, Internet article, or television segment focused on the topic of how to be more sexy and alluring. But where do you go to learn the lessons of how to be a lovely and lusty lady? Welcome to The Power of WOW: A 9-Week Course to Unleash the Confident, Sensual You, a virtual university dedicated to the higher learning of the sensual arts.

In We Live for the We, first-time mother Dani McClain sets out to understand how to raise her daughter in what she, as a black woman, knows to be an unjust—even hostile—society. Black women are more likely to die during pregnancy or birth than any other race; black mothers must stand before television cameras telling the world that their slain children were human beings. What, then, is the best way to keep fear at bay and raise a child so she lives with dignity and joy?

No real account of black women physicians in the US exists, and what little mention is made of these women in existing histories is often insubstantial or altogether incorrect. In this work of extensive research, Jasmine Brown offers a rich new perspective, penning the long-erased stories of nine pioneering black women physicians beginning in 1860, when a black woman first entered medical school.

When Beating the Odds: Raising Academically Successful African American Males appeared in 1998, it was hailed as "a crucial book" (Baltimore Sun) and "undoubtedly one of the most important tools the African American parent can possess" (Kweisi Mfume, President NAACP). Now, in response to enormous demand, the authors turn their attention to African American young women. Statistics indicate that African American females, as a group, fare poorly in the United States.

Black women are doing it all, and it's not just the Oprahs and Beyonces. There's an entire group of us that are just, well, regular. We're handling things like figuring out if this is the right time to speak up in that work meeting and risk our opinion now being the "voice" for all Black women at our job or if this is the right night to introduce our silk hair bonnet to our nighttime routine in the relationship that is just getting serious. These experiences range from impactful to trivial life decisions, but they shape who are.

In Modern Conversations of a Slave Mother, Mitchelle Harvey amplifies the voice of African-American mothers and shares the multi-generational experiences of these strong and resilient women who managed to thrive through adversity. In this book you will find out how challenges turn into success.

Vanella Morris is extremely happy with her long-time boyfriend, Alton. But Vanella is also uneasy and apprehensive about making the big commitment. The time has come to make the decision of her life: walk away now from this good thing, or convince Alton that, by living together, the marital bliss he longs for can still be theirs.

After the publication of the best-selling Letters to a Young Brother, accomplished actor and speaker Hill Harper began to receive an increasing number of moving letters from inmates who yearned for a connection with a successful role model. With disturbing statistics on African-American incarceration on his mind (one in six black men were incarcerated as of 2001, and one in three can now expect to go to prison some time in their lifetimes), Harper set out to address the specific needs of inmates.

An estimated one in four women and one in six men is abused by age 18, most often by someone they know. Most of these sexual assaults are never disclosed, much less reported to the police. No Secrets, No Lies demystifies the cultural taboos and social dynamics that keep Black families silent and enable abuse to continue for generations. Through compelling personal accounts from everyday people, Robin D. Stone, a sexual abuse survivor herself, illuminates the emotional, psychological and hidden consequences of remaining silent.

When MaryAnne Howland's son was turning 13, she organized a "Black Mitzvah" rite of passage celebration for him. Max is one of the one-in-three children in America being raised without a father in the home. Among African Americans, that number is reported to be as high as 72 percent. To help fill the father-shaped hole in Max's life as he transitioned from boyhood to manhood, MaryAnne invited four men from different corners of her life - an engineer, a philanthropist, a publisher, and a financial planner - to become Max's mentors.