Image via MsAfropolitan.com

The last year has been an empowering but also trying and chaotic time for women. Between the #MeToo phenomenon and the daily controversies over sexual politics, there is no doubt that we could all use some clarity on a whole range of issues. That is why the news of Minna Salami’s debut book couldn’t have come at a more appropriate time.

Salami made the announcement yesterday on her blog and social media pages.  She revealed that the book is titled Sensuous Knowledge: A Radical Black Feminist Approach for Everyone and will be published by Harper Collins in the US/ Canada and Zed Books in the UK/ Commonwealth. With the publication date set for summer 2019, we won’t have to wait too long.

Here is how she describes the work in the blogpost:

Sensuous Knowledge weaves together a number of disciplines such as personal narrative, feminist theory, pop culture, spirituality and African philosophy in order to encourage a new understanding of knowledge that is nevertheless rooted in historical truths. It will explore universal topics such as beauty, power, gender, globalisation, science and sexuality from a black feminist and Africa-centred perspective in contrast to the male and/or Eurocentric perspective we are inundated with.

The title of the book recalls Bell Hook’s Feminism for Everyone and, to a small extent, Adichie’s “We Should All Be Feminist” TED talk—texts that translate feminism in terms that a broader community of readers can relate to. But, more than anything else, we are intrigued by the very notion of situating black radical feminism as a context for addressing pressing questions about sexuality, gender, globalization, power, and beauty.

Salami also points out that it is important to her that Harper Collins’s Amistad imprint and Zed books are publishing the book since this places her in the company of her “foremost heroines”—authors such as bell hooks, Zora Neale Hurston, Nawal el Saadawi and Assata Shakur.

We are beyond delighted for Salami and thrilled that her book will be a significant intervention in key conversations taking place around the question of feminism and the plight of women in our contemporary moment.

Congrats Salami!

Stay tuned for more information about the publication of the book.