Publishing company will offer free Black history e-books, especially in Florida

A Chicago-based publishing house will offer free e-books focused on Black history after the College Board revised its Advanced Placement African American studies course earlier this month.

And Haymarket Books has Florida, specifically, in its sights.

The College Board’s revisions came after Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) refused to allow the class in Florida high schools. In the revised course, the subjects of Black queer studies, intersectionality and activism, the reparations movement and Black scholars associated with critical race theory have been removed. “Black conservatism” was added as a potential research topic.

Now, Haymarket Books, a “radical publisher of politics, culture, current events,” said DeSantis and the “complicit College Board” have left it with no choice.

“The racist governor of Florida continues to escalate his attacks on the freedom to learn and teach history,” the publishing house said in a press release last week.

“We at Haymarket stand in solidarity with all those in Florida and across the country who are organizing to resist. We know that books can be dangerous to those in power, especially when they are in the hands of folks who are organizing to fight for liberation. That’s why we publish them. That’s why they’re trying to ban them,” the company added.

Haymarket Books will offer the following e-books for free to download: “From Black Lives Matter to Black Liberation” by Keeanga Yamahtta, which explores why the Black Lives Matter movement is necessary; “Black Lives Matter at School: An Uprising for Educational Justice,” edited by Jesse Hagopian and Denisha Jones, which details how the Black Lives Matter movement has challenged institutional racism; and “1919” by Eve L. Ewing, a collection of poems depicting the Chicago race riots of 1919.

“Black people have always figured out ways to teach our history in spaces beneath, beyond, and betwixt the machinations of people like Ron DeSantis,” Ewing said. “The only thing he ever got right in his life was understanding how insurgent our stories really are, how threatening to the status quo of a nation built on theft.”

The company is also looking to provide Florida residents with more “radical books” to distribute to young people in the state.