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Kindred Creation

Parables and Paradigms for Freedom--Black worldmaking to reclaim our heritage and humanity

Foreword by Angela Y. Davis
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Paperback
$20.95 US
6"W x 8.97"H x 0.65"D   (15.2 x 22.8 x 1.7 cm) | 12 oz (352 g) | 36 per carton
On sale Dec 03, 2024 | 224 Pages | 9798889841364
Sales rights: World

A vital path home. Employing African epistemologies and an embodied African beingness, this book embraces the revelation and miracle of Blackness.

Creating a world worthy of our children requires recalling the dignity and distinction of the African way of life.


This book is not written for settler consumption. Kindred Creation is a call and response to dream and design better worlds rooted in African lifeways: a path to Black freedom, a love letter to Black futures, and a blueprint to intergenerational Black joy and dignity—all (and always) on Black terms.

Author, organizer, and designer Aida Mariam Davis explores the historical and ongoing impacts of settler colonialism, making explicit the ways that extraction, oppression, and enslavement serve the goals of empire—not least by severing ancestral connections and disrupting profound and ancient relationships to self, nature, and community.

Structured in three parts—Remember, Refuse, and ReclaimKindred Creation is a philosophical guidebook and a vital invitation to power and reconnection. Davis employs parable, poetry, theory, memory, narrative, and prophecy to help readers:

  • Remember: By unforgetting the unending and cascading violence of settler colonialism and other forms of domination and exploring the ways that African land, language, lifestyle, and labor are stolen, distorted, and repackaged for colonial consumption to extract capital and sever ties to ancestral knowledge, lifeways, and dignity
  • Refuse: By rejecting and interrupting death-making institutions and relationships and choosing kinship and self-determination in the face of settler colonial violence
  • Reclaim: By revealing that freedom is within us—and within reach. Davis shares how the reader can birth new worlds and relationships and offers strategies for reclaiming land, language, lifestyle, and labor.

The colonial violence and dispossession of African land, language, and labor is inflicted intentionally—and by design. Reclaiming African lifeways and remembering what was forcibly forgotten must be by creation: a re-membering of our interconnectedness and kinship.
"The parables in Kindred Creation show us the light on the walk of life."
—Nikki Giovanni, poet, author and seven time NAACP Image award winner

"Kindred Creation is an offering of high art, radical political philosophy, and spiritual nourishment. Read this book and prepare to be unsettled, challenged, inspired, and healed."
—Marc Lamont Hill, author and BET News correspondent

"... a lyrical, audacious appeal to decolonize everything in order to preserve and repair our planet. A vital contribution that needs to be translated into every language."
—Robin D. G. Kelley, author of Freedom Dreams

"A powerful testimony to the richness of African and Black knowledges. Both inspiring and poignant."
—Anna Tubbs, author of the New York Times best seller Three Mothers

"An invitation to rip colonial borders out of our hearts and souls by the roots, and then rebuild, restore, and reimagine what lives lived together could look like.... an invitation to be made whole."
—Patty Krawec, cohost of the Medicine for the Resistance podcast, cofounder of the Nii'kinaaganaa Foundation, and author of Becoming Kin

"Kindred Creation moves us in the direction toward decolonial futures in ways we didn't know we needed."
—Kyle T. Mays, PhD, author of An Afro-Indigenous History of the United States

"This book is a marvel.... it just may be the spark needed to compel serious transformative action."
—Daniel O. Sayers, author of A Desolate Place for a Defiant People

"Clear-sighted and precise, heart-centered and expansive. A balm."
—Angela Flournoy, author of the New York Times Notable Book The Turner House

"A revival and a revelation.... Kindred Creation shows us the magic, majesty, and magnificence that is Blackness. A must-read for anyone working to create a future worthy of our children."
—Michael Tubbs, special advisor for economic mobility to CA Governor Newsom and former mayor of Stockton

"This precious book reminds us that if we refuse to acknowledge our individual and collective responsibility in caring for the earth and all beings on it, it is at our own peril. Love is the answer to every question."
—Ericka Huggins, author of Comrade Sister

"Kindred Creation is in the family way with languages, musings, musicalities, worldviews, ontologies, epistemologies, and axiologies of free and ancient futures."
—Fania Davis, civil rights attorney and restorative justice practitioner

"A must-read for all schools and for parents of Black children who can use Aida's smart, decolonized lens as a tool to reimagine/create a revolutionary new world of freedom."
—Jessica McKay, New York Times best-selling author of Always with You, Always with Me

"Aida's vision and voice are seminal and represent the leadership necessary to unlock the promise of the nation by unleashing the promise in us all."
—Dr. Michael McAfee, president and CEO of PolicyLink

"The American experiment in democracy may be nearly 250 years old, but our attempt to realize a multiracial and pluralistic society of free and equal citizens has yet to be born.... Kindred Creation reminds us that we must look backward to reclaim and repair in order to chart any path forward."
—Rob Reich, professor of political science at Stanford University
© Rebecca Francois
Davis founded and led Decolonize Design, a boutique consulting firm with clients spanning the nonprofit sector and Fortune 500 companies. She created the Belonging, Dignity, Justice, and Joy (BDJJ) framework as an alternative to the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI). View titles by Aida Mariam Davis
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•     Bahamas
•     Bahrain
•     Bangladesh
•     Barbados
•     Belarus
•     Belgium
•     Belize
•     Benin
•     Bermuda
•     Bhutan
•     Bolivia
•     Bonaire, Saba
•     Bosnia Herzeg.
•     Botswana
•     Bouvet Island
•     Brazil
•     Brit.Ind.Oc.Ter
•     Brit.Virgin Is.
•     Brunei
•     Bulgaria
•     Burkina Faso
•     Burundi
•     Cambodia
•     Cameroon
•     Canada
•     Cape Verde
•     Cayman Islands
•     Centr.Afr.Rep.
•     Chad
•     Chile
•     China
•     Christmas Islnd
•     Cocos Islands
•     Colombia
•     Comoro Is.
•     Congo
•     Cook Islands
•     Costa Rica
•     Croatia
•     Cuba
•     Curacao
•     Cyprus
•     Czech Republic
•     Dem. Rep. Congo
•     Denmark
•     Djibouti
•     Dominica
•     Dominican Rep.
•     Ecuador
•     Egypt
•     El Salvador
•     Equatorial Gui.
•     Eritrea
•     Estonia
•     Ethiopia
•     Falkland Islnds
•     Faroe Islands
•     Fiji
•     Finland
•     France
•     Fren.Polynesia
•     French Guinea
•     Gabon
•     Gambia
•     Georgia
•     Germany
•     Ghana
•     Gibraltar
•     Greece
•     Greenland
•     Grenada
•     Guadeloupe
•     Guam
•     Guatemala
•     Guernsey
•     Guinea Republic
•     Guinea-Bissau
•     Guyana
•     Haiti
•     Heard/McDon.Isl
•     Honduras
•     Hong Kong
•     Hungary
•     Iceland
•     India
•     Indonesia
•     Iran
•     Iraq
•     Ireland
•     Isle of Man
•     Israel
•     Italy
•     Ivory Coast
•     Jamaica
•     Japan
•     Jersey
•     Jordan
•     Kazakhstan
•     Kenya
•     Kiribati
•     Kuwait
•     Kyrgyzstan
•     Laos
•     Latvia
•     Lebanon
•     Lesotho
•     Liberia
•     Libya
•     Liechtenstein
•     Lithuania
•     Luxembourg
•     Macau
•     Macedonia
•     Madagascar
•     Malawi
•     Malaysia
•     Maldives
•     Mali
•     Malta
•     Marshall island
•     Martinique
•     Mauritania
•     Mauritius
•     Mayotte
•     Mexico
•     Micronesia
•     Minor Outl.Ins.
•     Moldavia
•     Monaco
•     Mongolia
•     Montenegro
•     Montserrat
•     Morocco
•     Mozambique
•     Myanmar
•     Namibia
•     Nauru
•     Nepal
•     Netherlands
•     New Caledonia
•     New Zealand
•     Nicaragua
•     Niger
•     Nigeria
•     Niue
•     Norfolk Island
•     North Korea
•     North Mariana
•     Norway
•     Oman
•     Pakistan
•     Palau
•     Palestinian Ter
•     Panama
•     PapuaNewGuinea
•     Paraguay
•     Peru
•     Philippines
•     Pitcairn Islnds
•     Poland
•     Portugal
•     Puerto Rico
•     Qatar
•     Reunion Island
•     Romania
•     Russian Fed.
•     Rwanda
•     S. Sandwich Ins
•     Saint Martin
•     Samoa,American
•     San Marino
•     SaoTome Princip
•     Saudi Arabia
•     Senegal
•     Serbia
•     Seychelles
•     Sierra Leone
•     Singapore
•     Sint Maarten
•     Slovakia
•     Slovenia
•     Solomon Islands
•     Somalia
•     South Africa
•     South Korea
•     South Sudan
•     Spain
•     Sri Lanka
•     St Barthelemy
•     St. Helena
•     St. Lucia
•     St. Vincent
•     St.Chr.,Nevis
•     St.Pier,Miquel.
•     Sth Terr. Franc
•     Sudan
•     Suriname
•     Svalbard
•     Swaziland
•     Sweden
•     Switzerland
•     Syria
•     Tadschikistan
•     Taiwan
•     Tanzania
•     Thailand
•     Timor-Leste
•     Togo
•     Tokelau Islands
•     Tonga
•     Trinidad,Tobago
•     Tunisia
•     Turkey
•     Turkmenistan
•     Turks&Caicos Is
•     Tuvalu
•     US Virgin Is.
•     USA
•     Uganda
•     Ukraine
•     Unit.Arab Emir.
•     United Kingdom
•     Uruguay
•     Uzbekistan
•     Vanuatu
•     Vatican City
•     Venezuela
•     Vietnam
•     Wallis,Futuna
•     West Saharan
•     Western Samoa
•     Yemen
•     Zambia
•     Zimbabwe

About

A vital path home. Employing African epistemologies and an embodied African beingness, this book embraces the revelation and miracle of Blackness.

Creating a world worthy of our children requires recalling the dignity and distinction of the African way of life.


This book is not written for settler consumption. Kindred Creation is a call and response to dream and design better worlds rooted in African lifeways: a path to Black freedom, a love letter to Black futures, and a blueprint to intergenerational Black joy and dignity—all (and always) on Black terms.

Author, organizer, and designer Aida Mariam Davis explores the historical and ongoing impacts of settler colonialism, making explicit the ways that extraction, oppression, and enslavement serve the goals of empire—not least by severing ancestral connections and disrupting profound and ancient relationships to self, nature, and community.

Structured in three parts—Remember, Refuse, and ReclaimKindred Creation is a philosophical guidebook and a vital invitation to power and reconnection. Davis employs parable, poetry, theory, memory, narrative, and prophecy to help readers:

  • Remember: By unforgetting the unending and cascading violence of settler colonialism and other forms of domination and exploring the ways that African land, language, lifestyle, and labor are stolen, distorted, and repackaged for colonial consumption to extract capital and sever ties to ancestral knowledge, lifeways, and dignity
  • Refuse: By rejecting and interrupting death-making institutions and relationships and choosing kinship and self-determination in the face of settler colonial violence
  • Reclaim: By revealing that freedom is within us—and within reach. Davis shares how the reader can birth new worlds and relationships and offers strategies for reclaiming land, language, lifestyle, and labor.

The colonial violence and dispossession of African land, language, and labor is inflicted intentionally—and by design. Reclaiming African lifeways and remembering what was forcibly forgotten must be by creation: a re-membering of our interconnectedness and kinship.

Praise

"The parables in Kindred Creation show us the light on the walk of life."
—Nikki Giovanni, poet, author and seven time NAACP Image award winner

"Kindred Creation is an offering of high art, radical political philosophy, and spiritual nourishment. Read this book and prepare to be unsettled, challenged, inspired, and healed."
—Marc Lamont Hill, author and BET News correspondent

"... a lyrical, audacious appeal to decolonize everything in order to preserve and repair our planet. A vital contribution that needs to be translated into every language."
—Robin D. G. Kelley, author of Freedom Dreams

"A powerful testimony to the richness of African and Black knowledges. Both inspiring and poignant."
—Anna Tubbs, author of the New York Times best seller Three Mothers

"An invitation to rip colonial borders out of our hearts and souls by the roots, and then rebuild, restore, and reimagine what lives lived together could look like.... an invitation to be made whole."
—Patty Krawec, cohost of the Medicine for the Resistance podcast, cofounder of the Nii'kinaaganaa Foundation, and author of Becoming Kin

"Kindred Creation moves us in the direction toward decolonial futures in ways we didn't know we needed."
—Kyle T. Mays, PhD, author of An Afro-Indigenous History of the United States

"This book is a marvel.... it just may be the spark needed to compel serious transformative action."
—Daniel O. Sayers, author of A Desolate Place for a Defiant People

"Clear-sighted and precise, heart-centered and expansive. A balm."
—Angela Flournoy, author of the New York Times Notable Book The Turner House

"A revival and a revelation.... Kindred Creation shows us the magic, majesty, and magnificence that is Blackness. A must-read for anyone working to create a future worthy of our children."
—Michael Tubbs, special advisor for economic mobility to CA Governor Newsom and former mayor of Stockton

"This precious book reminds us that if we refuse to acknowledge our individual and collective responsibility in caring for the earth and all beings on it, it is at our own peril. Love is the answer to every question."
—Ericka Huggins, author of Comrade Sister

"Kindred Creation is in the family way with languages, musings, musicalities, worldviews, ontologies, epistemologies, and axiologies of free and ancient futures."
—Fania Davis, civil rights attorney and restorative justice practitioner

"A must-read for all schools and for parents of Black children who can use Aida's smart, decolonized lens as a tool to reimagine/create a revolutionary new world of freedom."
—Jessica McKay, New York Times best-selling author of Always with You, Always with Me

"Aida's vision and voice are seminal and represent the leadership necessary to unlock the promise of the nation by unleashing the promise in us all."
—Dr. Michael McAfee, president and CEO of PolicyLink

"The American experiment in democracy may be nearly 250 years old, but our attempt to realize a multiracial and pluralistic society of free and equal citizens has yet to be born.... Kindred Creation reminds us that we must look backward to reclaim and repair in order to chart any path forward."
—Rob Reich, professor of political science at Stanford University

Author

© Rebecca Francois
Davis founded and led Decolonize Design, a boutique consulting firm with clients spanning the nonprofit sector and Fortune 500 companies. She created the Belonging, Dignity, Justice, and Joy (BDJJ) framework as an alternative to the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI). View titles by Aida Mariam Davis

Rights

Available for sale exclusive:
•     Afghanistan
•     Aland Islands
•     Albania
•     Algeria
•     Andorra
•     Angola
•     Anguilla
•     Antarctica
•     Antigua/Barbuda
•     Argentina
•     Armenia
•     Aruba
•     Australia
•     Austria
•     Azerbaijan
•     Bahamas
•     Bahrain
•     Bangladesh
•     Barbados
•     Belarus
•     Belgium
•     Belize
•     Benin
•     Bermuda
•     Bhutan
•     Bolivia
•     Bonaire, Saba
•     Bosnia Herzeg.
•     Botswana
•     Bouvet Island
•     Brazil
•     Brit.Ind.Oc.Ter
•     Brit.Virgin Is.
•     Brunei
•     Bulgaria
•     Burkina Faso
•     Burundi
•     Cambodia
•     Cameroon
•     Canada
•     Cape Verde
•     Cayman Islands
•     Centr.Afr.Rep.
•     Chad
•     Chile
•     China
•     Christmas Islnd
•     Cocos Islands
•     Colombia
•     Comoro Is.
•     Congo
•     Cook Islands
•     Costa Rica
•     Croatia
•     Cuba
•     Curacao
•     Cyprus
•     Czech Republic
•     Dem. Rep. Congo
•     Denmark
•     Djibouti
•     Dominica
•     Dominican Rep.
•     Ecuador
•     Egypt
•     El Salvador
•     Equatorial Gui.
•     Eritrea
•     Estonia
•     Ethiopia
•     Falkland Islnds
•     Faroe Islands
•     Fiji
•     Finland
•     France
•     Fren.Polynesia
•     French Guinea
•     Gabon
•     Gambia
•     Georgia
•     Germany
•     Ghana
•     Gibraltar
•     Greece
•     Greenland
•     Grenada
•     Guadeloupe
•     Guam
•     Guatemala
•     Guernsey
•     Guinea Republic
•     Guinea-Bissau
•     Guyana
•     Haiti
•     Heard/McDon.Isl
•     Honduras
•     Hong Kong
•     Hungary
•     Iceland
•     India
•     Indonesia
•     Iran
•     Iraq
•     Ireland
•     Isle of Man
•     Israel
•     Italy
•     Ivory Coast
•     Jamaica
•     Japan
•     Jersey
•     Jordan
•     Kazakhstan
•     Kenya
•     Kiribati
•     Kuwait
•     Kyrgyzstan
•     Laos
•     Latvia
•     Lebanon
•     Lesotho
•     Liberia
•     Libya
•     Liechtenstein
•     Lithuania
•     Luxembourg
•     Macau
•     Macedonia
•     Madagascar
•     Malawi
•     Malaysia
•     Maldives
•     Mali
•     Malta
•     Marshall island
•     Martinique
•     Mauritania
•     Mauritius
•     Mayotte
•     Mexico
•     Micronesia
•     Minor Outl.Ins.
•     Moldavia
•     Monaco
•     Mongolia
•     Montenegro
•     Montserrat
•     Morocco
•     Mozambique
•     Myanmar
•     Namibia
•     Nauru
•     Nepal
•     Netherlands
•     New Caledonia
•     New Zealand
•     Nicaragua
•     Niger
•     Nigeria
•     Niue
•     Norfolk Island
•     North Korea
•     North Mariana
•     Norway
•     Oman
•     Pakistan
•     Palau
•     Palestinian Ter
•     Panama
•     PapuaNewGuinea
•     Paraguay
•     Peru
•     Philippines
•     Pitcairn Islnds
•     Poland
•     Portugal
•     Puerto Rico
•     Qatar
•     Reunion Island
•     Romania
•     Russian Fed.
•     Rwanda
•     S. Sandwich Ins
•     Saint Martin
•     Samoa,American
•     San Marino
•     SaoTome Princip
•     Saudi Arabia
•     Senegal
•     Serbia
•     Seychelles
•     Sierra Leone
•     Singapore
•     Sint Maarten
•     Slovakia
•     Slovenia
•     Solomon Islands
•     Somalia
•     South Africa
•     South Korea
•     South Sudan
•     Spain
•     Sri Lanka
•     St Barthelemy
•     St. Helena
•     St. Lucia
•     St. Vincent
•     St.Chr.,Nevis
•     St.Pier,Miquel.
•     Sth Terr. Franc
•     Sudan
•     Suriname
•     Svalbard
•     Swaziland
•     Sweden
•     Switzerland
•     Syria
•     Tadschikistan
•     Taiwan
•     Tanzania
•     Thailand
•     Timor-Leste
•     Togo
•     Tokelau Islands
•     Tonga
•     Trinidad,Tobago
•     Tunisia
•     Turkey
•     Turkmenistan
•     Turks&Caicos Is
•     Tuvalu
•     US Virgin Is.
•     USA
•     Uganda
•     Ukraine
•     Unit.Arab Emir.
•     United Kingdom
•     Uruguay
•     Uzbekistan
•     Vanuatu
•     Vatican City
•     Venezuela
•     Vietnam
•     Wallis,Futuna
•     West Saharan
•     Western Samoa
•     Yemen
•     Zambia
•     Zimbabwe