The movement began in 2013 with the hashtag #BlackLivesMatter after the acquittal of George Zimmerman in the shooting death of Trayvon Martin, an unarmed 17-year-old African American student. Since then, it has grown into an international grassroots organization dedicated to the eradication of violence against people of color, race and intersectional-based discrimination of all kinds, and systemic racism. Founded by the originators of the hashtag, Alicia Garza, Patrice Cullors, and Opal Tometi, the organization operates without hierarchical leadership and largely relies on social media to organize protests and speak out, often in response to acts of police brutality against Black people.
Here you will find resources of varying formality related to Black Lives Matter and antiracism. The eBooks found here are available to the University of Detroit Mercy community via Blackboard login, while the other resources listed can be accessed freely online. There are many more resources available online, as well as in the Library. Also consider checking out related resources found in the Library's African American Studies and Race, Inclusion and Society guides, or Detroit Mercy's Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion.
If you have questions or need help finding or evaluating a resource, please contact a librarian.
A condensed and accessible intellectual history that traces the genesis of the ideas that have built into the #BlackLivesMatter movement in a bid to help us make sense of the emotions, demands, and arguments of present-day activists and public thinkers.
This second edition examines broad systems of inequality in our society—how they’re structured, how they harm Black people, and how we can work for positive change.
Timothy C. Shiell utilizes an interdisciplinary approach to demonstrate that a strong commitment to civil liberty and to racial equality are mutually supportive, as they share an opposition to orthodoxy and a commitment to greater inclusion and participation.
As we enter a time period in which police interactions are recorded (dash cams or body cams, for example) and new populations are being targeted (Latinx people), there is much to learn about what is working and what is not.
Eduardo Bonilla-Silva's acclaimed Racism without Racists documents how, beneath our contemporary conversation about race, there lies a full-blown arsenal of arguments, phrases, and stories that whites use to account for--and ultimately justify--racial inequalities. The fifth edition of this provocative book makes clear that color blind racism is as insidious now as ever.
George Lipsitz's classic book The Possessive Investment in Whiteness argues that public policy and private prejudice work together to create a possessive investment in whiteness that is responsible for the racialized hierarchies of our society.
"This accessible, personal, supportive, and practical guide is ideal for students, community activists, teachers, youth workers, and anyone interested in issues of diversity, multiculturalism, and social justice."
Black Marxism by 
The Condemnation of Blackness by 
The Fire Next Time by 
Sister Outsider by 
From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation by 
Making All Black Lives Matter by While the Detroit Mercy Library should be able to provide our students, faculty, and staff with the information resources they need for their coursework or other research, inevitably there will be times patrons wish to purchase books that may or may not be available through our campus bookstore. While the Library does not endorse or promote any particular bookstore, here are some local Black-owned bookstores that sell titles related to Black Lives Matter and other related (and unrelated) topics.