Why have a section dedicated to the theme of social justice?
Social justice is perhaps the fastest growing theme in young adult literature today. As you click through our award winners category, you will see many titles connected to this theme as well. Additionally, social justice titles represent a great portion of the circulation at the WHHS library. As literature and art reflect the culture in which they are created, it only makes sense to have a category dedicated to some of these important reads.
Social justice is perhaps the fastest growing theme in young adult literature today. As you click through our award winners category, you will see many titles connected to this theme as well. Additionally, social justice titles represent a great portion of the circulation at the WHHS library. As literature and art reflect the culture in which they are created, it only makes sense to have a category dedicated to some of these important reads.
Fabiola Toussaint and her mother have been dreaming of life in the states for years. When they finally arrive in a NJ airport from Haiti, something goes wrong. Fabiola clears customs, but her mother is detained. She yells to Fab to catch their connecting flight to Detroit to meet their extended family. In Detroit, Fabiola lives on the corner of American and Joy streets with her aunt and cousins. Here, she tries to discern the reality of the American dream while her mother is detained by ICE. Poignant and current, American Street by Ibi Zoboi is a powerful reminder of the difficult choices many Americans face everyday.
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The construct of race has always been used to gain and keep power, to create dynamics that separate and silence. This remarkable reimagining of Dr. Ibram X. Kendi's National Book Award-winning Stamped from the Beginning reveals the history of racist ideas in America, and inspires hope for an antiracist future. It takes you on a race journey from then to now, shows you why we feel how we feel, and why the poison of racism lingers. It also proves that while racist ideas have always been easy to fabricate and distribute, they can also be discredited.
Through a gripping, fast-paced, and energizing narrative written by beloved award-winner Jason Reynolds, this book shines a light on the many insidious forms of racist ideas--and on ways readers can identify and stamp out racist thoughts in their daily lives.
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Justyce McAllister is a good kid, an honor student, and always there to help a friend—but none of that matters to the police officer who just put him in handcuffs. Despite leaving his rough neighborhood behind, he can't escape the scorn of his former peers or the ridicule of his new classmates.
Justyce looks to the teachings of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. for answers. But do they hold up anymore? He starts a journal to Dr. King to find out.
Then comes the day Justyce goes driving with his best friend, Manny, windows rolled down, music turned up—way up, sparking the fury of a white off-duty cop beside them. Words fly. Shots are fired. Justyce and Manny are caught in the crosshairs. In the media fallout, it's Justyce who is under attack.
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In the highly anticipated sequel to her New York Times bestseller, Nic Stone delivers an unflinching look into the flawed practices and silenced voices in the American juvenile justice system.
Vernell LaQuan Banks and Justyce McAllister grew up a block apart in the Southwest Atlanta neighborhood of Wynwood Heights. Years later, though, Justyce walks the illustrious halls of Yale University . . . and Quan sits behind bars at the Fulton Regional Youth Detention Center.
Through a series of flashbacks, vignettes, and letters to Justyce--the protagonist of Dear Martin--Quan's story takes form. Troubles at home and misunderstandings at school give rise to police encounters and tough decisions. But then there's a dead cop and a weapon with Quan's prints on it. What leads a bright kid down a road to a murder charge? Not even Quan is sure.
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Xiomara Batista cannot hide— her body gets her an attention she can never escape. Her greatest release is in the pages of her journal... and her new lab partner, Aman. But Xio’s Mami only wants her worried about Confirmation class and God’s will. This novel in verse by Dominican author Elizabeth Acevedo explores the challenges of finding one’s own identity, even when it doesn’t fully align with parental expectations— especially as a first generation American.
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Acclaimed author Renee Watson offers a powerful story about a girl striving for success in a world that too often seems like it's trying to break her.
Jade believes she must get out of her poor neighborhood if she's ever going to succeed. Her mother tells her to take advantage of every opportunity that comes her way. And Jade has: every day she rides the bus away from her friends and to the private school where she feels like an outsider, but where she has plenty of opportunities. But some opportunities she doesn't really welcome, like an invitation to join Women to Women, a mentorship program for "at-risk" girls. Just because her mentor is black and graduated from the same high school doesn't mean she understands where Jade is coming from. She's tired of being singled out as someone who needs help, someone people want to fix. Jade wants to speak, to create, to express her joys and sorrows, her pain and her hope. Maybe there are some things she could show other women about understanding the world and finding ways to be real, to make a difference.
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Sunny is used to being in the in-between places. She lives in Nigeria, but she was born in the US. She looks West African, but she's also an albino. She doesn't belong anywhere. Life isn't easy. But she's about to find out that her "shortcomings" might be her biggest strength. Follow Sunny as she finds out the power of magic and friendship, in the first book of Nnedi Okorafor's fantasy duology.
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Bryan Stevenson, acclaimed lawyer and social justice advocate, works to protect basic human rights for the most vulnerable people in American society--the poor, the wrongly convicted, and those whose lives have been marked by discrimination and marginalization. Through this adaptation, young people of today will find themselves called to action and compassion in the pursuit of justice.
A portion of the proceeds of this book will go to charity to help in Stevenson's important work to benefit the voiceless and the vulnerable as they attempt to navigate the broken U.S. justice system.
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Trevor Noah’s unlikely path from apartheid South Africa to the desk of The Daily Show began with a criminal act: his birth. Trevor was born to a white Swiss father and a black Xhosa mother at a time when such a union was punishable by five years in prison. Living proof of his parents’ indiscretion, Trevor was kept mostly indoors for the earliest years of his life, bound by the extreme and often absurd measures his mother took to hide him from a government that could, at any moment, steal him away. Finally liberated by the end of South Africa’s tyrannical white rule, Trevor and his mother set forth on a grand adventure, living openly and freely and embracing the opportunities won by a centuries-long struggle.
Born a Crime is the story of a mischievous young boy who grows into a restless young man as he struggles to find himself in a world where he was never supposed to exist. It is also the story of that young man’s relationship with his fearless, rebellious, and fervently religious mother—his teammate, a woman determined to save her son from the cycle of poverty, violence, and abuse that would ultimately threaten her own life.
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