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i am so proud to be here today. my name is peniel joseph and i professor of history at tufts university and director of the center of study for democracy there. welcome to the decision 2012 great democracy and the new jim crow. we have a standing-room-only audience at the harlem book fair. as a native new yorker i am very proud to be here with this panel of luminaries. i am going to do a brief introduction and i am going to set the stage for what is going to follow. we ve got sonia sanchez. [applause] professor b8 is a national and international treasurer. she s a human rights activist, poet, civil rights activist, feminist, humanist, mother, teacher, daughter, and really one of the heroic figures of the post civil-rights and civil rights of black power era. her latest book is morning haiku and she has edited 44 african-american writers on the election of barack obama, 44th president of the united states. [applause] next we have professor cornell west. [applause] wi ....
we ve got sonia sanchez. [applause] professor b8 is a national and international treasurer. she s a human rights activist, poet, civil rights activist, feminist, humanist, mother, teacher, daughter, and really one of the heroic figures of the post civil-rights and civil rights of black power era. her latest book is morning haiku and she has edited 44 african-american writers on the election of barack obama, 44th president of the united states. [applause] next we have professor cornell west. [applause] with cornell as we all know is another national and international icon and in national treasure in his own right. he is a professor of civil rights activists philosopher, human rights activist who and really one of the boldest public intellectuals that we have in the united states today. he speaks truth to power even when when he speaks is unpopular he has the structure to be critical and against the grain even when it s hurt him and is standing in the black community. so ....
right is carol mackey, the editor-in-chief of the black expressions book club and the author of [inaudible] my goodness. to her right is the one and only zane. zane we know her work. i liked zane s work because i would have this book here and behind the book i would be reading zane. [laughter] she is what we call a brown dab author. we all know about zane s success. her work has been translated in many languages across the world, and for me that explains the recent growth in population across the world. to her right is charmaine parker, the publishing director of strebor books and author of the next phase of flight. estimate what is interesting about these women is that they are both powerhouses in publishing but also authors so they know the park. and because of the digital shift , the understand the black books in particular are imperiled because we are market-driven and publishers really pay attention based on how many books we purchased. so when that switches ov ....
[inaudible conversations] - max rodriguez founder of the harlem book fair. this is our 14th year. thank you so much for joining us. our theme this year is enlightenment through literacy and with that simply means is that as we get access to information, we can use that information to increase, to enhance the quality of our lives. our family lives, our children s lives and the lives of our communities. the life of america frankly because don t we contribute every day in the things that we do and in this basis that we hold and the work that we hold and the families that we take care of? access to information is critical especially now the digital technology just sort of changing everything, how we access to information. i have a story about how books have always been the means by which information is delivered and now that means by which is being changed has shifted to digital so it causes and then packed in the book world and we know that it does and it has what what r ....