Audiobooks narrated by Amir Abdullah

Thrive: Maximizing Well-Being in the Age of AI

Artificial intelligence (AI) is a powerful general-purpose technology that is reshaping the modern economy, but misperceptions about AI stand in the way of harnessing it for the betterment of humanity. In Thrive, Ravi Bapna and Anindya Ghose counter the backlash by showcasing how AI is positively influencing the aspects of our daily lives that we care about most: our health and wellness, relationships, education, the workplace, and domestic life. In the process the authors help explain the underlying technology and give people the agency they need to shape the debate around how we should regulate AI to maximize its benefits and minimize its risks. Bringing over two decades of experience with cutting-edge research, consulting, executive coaching, and advising to bear on the subject, Bapna and Ghose demystify the technology of AI itself. They offer a novel 'House of AI' framework that encompasses traditional analytics, generative AI, and fair and ethical deployment of AI. Using examples from everyday life, they showcase how the modern AI-powered ecosystem fundamentally improves the emotional, physical, and material well-being of regular people across the globe. Thrive's mission is to educate the public about AI, shape realistic expectations, and foster informed discussions about a fast-emerging AI-shaped society.

Anindya Ghose, Ravi Bapna (Author), Amir Abdullah (Narrator)

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Of Black Study

An exploration of the ways that Black intellectuals arrived at a critique of Western knowledge 'This magnificent book is the best recent treatment we have of the great Black Radical Tradition.' —Cornel West Joshua Myers considers the work of thinkers who broke with the racial and colonial logic of academic disciplinarity and how the ideas of Black intellectuals created different ways of thinking and knowing in their pursuit of conceptual and epistemological freedom. Bookended by meditations with June Jordan and Toni Cade Bambara, Of Black Study focuses on how W.E.B. Du Bois, Sylvia Wynter, Jacob Carruthers, and Cedric Robinson contributed to Black Studies approaches to knowledge production within and beyond Western structures of knowledge. Especially geared toward understanding the contemporary evolution of Black Studies in the neoliberal university and allows us to consider the stakes of intellectual freedom and the path toward a new world.

Joshua Myers (Author), Amir Abdullah (Narrator)

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The Grandfather of Black Basketball: The Life and Times of Dr. E. B. Henderson

Dr. Edwin Bancroft Henderson was the son of working-class parents born in slavery. Henderson attended Harvard University's Dudley Sargent School of Physical Training. There he met the leaders in the new field of physical education and recognized athletics—and basketball, especially—as a public health initiative and a way that young Blacks could gain college scholarships and debunk the idea of racial inferiority. In The Grandfather of Black Basketball, Edwin Bancroft Henderson II—Dr. Henderson's grandson—provides unprecedented detail and fascinating insight into this influential figure in Black history. Henderson organized the first athletic league for Blacks, introduced basketball to Black people on a wide-scale, organized basis, and founded associations to train and organize Black officials and referees. He was instrumental in founding the first rural branch of the NAACP, advocated for school desegregation, and held executive board positions with multiple NAACP branches. Overlooked for decades, Henderson was finally enshrined in the National Basketball Hall of Fame in 2013 as a contributor. The Grandfather of Black Basketball gives long-overdue recognition to a sports pioneer, civil rights activist, author, educator, and pragmatic humanitarian who fought his entire life to improve opportunities for youth through athletics.

Edwin Bancroft Henderson II (Author), Amir Abdullah (Narrator)

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When I Passed the Statue of Liberty I Became Black

The lost memoir of Britain's first Black Olympic medal winner—and the America he discovered After winning Olympic medals for Britain in 1920, Harry Edward (1898–1973) decided to try his luck in America. The country he found was full of thrilling opportunity and pervasive racism. Immensely capable and energetic, Harry rubbed shoulders with kings and presidents, was influential in the revival of Black theatre during the Harlem Renaissance, and became a passionate humanitarian and advocate for child welfare. He was present at some of the twentieth century's most significant moments, worked alongside W. E. B. Du Bois and Orson Welles, and witnessed two world wars and the civil rights movement. Yet he was frustrated at almost every turn. Toward the end of his life he set down his story, crafting this memoir of athletics and activism, race and racism on both sides of the Atlantic. His manuscript went unpublished until now. This is the deeply engaging tale of Edward's life—and a moving testament to his drive to form a better world.

Harry Edward (Author), Amir Abdullah (Narrator)

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The Minotaur at Calle Lanza

A 'hauntingly effective' surrealist travel memoir about the mysterious transformations that may lurk inside us all (Library Journal, starred review). Venice, 2020. As a pandemic rages across the globe, Zito Madu finds himself in a nearly deserted city, its walls and basilicas humming with strange magic. As he wanders a haunted landscape, we see him twist further into his own past: his family's difficult immigration from Nigeria to Detroit, his troubled relationship with his father, the sporadic joys of daily life and solitude, his experiences with migration, poverty, foreignness, racism, and his own rage and regret. But as it is with all labyrinths, after finding its center, will he come away unscathed, or will he transform into the gripping, fantastical monstrousness that's out to consume him whole? With nods to Italo Calvino and Jorge Luis Borges, this surrealist debut memoir takes us into the labyrinth of memory and the monsters lurking there.

Zito Madu (Author), Amir Abdullah (Narrator)

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Frontline Bodies: Sports and Black Struggles for Justice since the Late Nineteenth Century

In Frontline Bodies, Nicolas Martin-Breteau argues that sports are not-and have never been-purely about entertainment for Black Americans. Instead, beginning in the 1890s during Reconstruction, Black Americans proactively used athletics as a tactic to fight racial oppression. Martin-Breteau considers the work of Edwin B. Henderson, a prominent Black physical educator, civil rights activist, and historian of Black sports. Training Black children as athletes, Henderson felt, would work both to fortify racial pride and to dismantle racial prejudices-two necessary requirements for a successful political liberation struggle. In this way, physical education became political education. By the end of the twentieth century, Martin-Breteau argues, racial uplift through sports had lost its emancipating power. The emphasis on the accumulation of wealth for professional athletes, as well as sports' ability to reinforce anti-Black stereotypes, had become a political problem for true collective liberation. For a marginalized group of people that has been physically excluded from the democratic process, however, sports remain a political resource. By studying the relationship between athletics and politics, Frontline Bodies renews the history of minority bodies and their power of action.

Nicolas Martin-Breteau (Author), Amir Abdullah (Narrator)

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A Muslim American Slave: The Life of Omar Ibn Said

Born to a wealthy family in West Africa around 1770, Omar Ibn Said was abducted and sold into slavery in the United States, where he came to the attention of a prominent North Carolina family after filling 'the walls of his room with piteous petitions to be released, all written in the Arabic language,' as one local newspaper reported. Ibn Said soon became a local celebrity, and in 1831 he was asked to write his life story, producing the only known surviving American slave narrative written in Arabic. In A Muslim American Slave, Ala Alryyes offers both a definitive translation and an authoritative edition of this singularly important work, lending new insights into the early history of Islam in America and exploring the multiple, shifting interpretations of Ibn Said's narrative by the nineteenth-century missionaries, ethnographers, and intellectuals who championed it. This edition presents the English translation of Ibn Said's Arabic narrative, augmented by Alryyes's comprehensive introduction, contextual essays and historical commentary by leading literary critics and scholars of Islam and the African diaspora and other writings by Omar Ibn Said. The result is an invaluable addition to our understanding of writings by enslaved Americans and a timely reminder that 'Islam' and 'America' are not mutually exclusive terms.

Omar Ibn Said (Author), Amir Abdullah (Narrator)

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12 Years a Slave - Unabridged

'12 Years a Slave' is the harrowing, true account of a free Black man living in New York during the early 1800's who is kidnaped, transported to Louisiana and forced to work and live as a slave for over a decade. Written by the man who experienced these horrors - Solomon Northup - this book is a powerful and disturbing first-hand account of what it was like to live under the lash and chronicles the torments Northup endured in attempting to escape his captors and return home to his family in New York. Northup's book was an immediate sensation when it was first published and was often singled out by the abolitionist movement as a foundational document in the argument to end the dehumanizing and morally bankrupt practice of human slavery in America. In 2013, it was the basis for the award-winning film of the same name. '12 Years a Slave' is presented here in its original and unabridged format.

Solomon Northup (Author), Amir Abdullah (Narrator)

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Genealogies of Religion: Discipline and Reasons of Power in Christianity and Islam

In Geneologies of Religion, Talal Asad explores how religion as a historical category emerged in the West and has come to be applied as a universal concept. The idea that religion has undergone a radical change since the Christian Reformation-from totalitarian and socially repressive to private and relatively benign-is a familiar part of the story of secularization. It is often invoked to explain and justify the liberal politics and world view of modernity. And it leads to the view that 'politicized religions' threaten both reason and liberty. Asad's essays explore and question all these assumptions. He argues that 'religion' is a construction of European modernity, a construction that authorizes-for Westerners and non-Westerners alike-particular forms of 'history making.'

Talal Asad (Author), Amir Abdullah (Narrator)

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Purple Rising: Celebrating 40 Years of the Magic, Power, and Artistry of The Color Purple

Celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Pulitzer Prize–winning masterpiece The Color Purple—as well as the acclaimed 1985 film from Steven Spielberg, the Tony-winning Broadway musical, and the all-new film adaptation with this gorgeously designed exploration of the novel's enduring legacy, featuring contributions from Alice Walker, Oprah Winfrey, Steven Spielberg, Colman Domingo, Fantasia Barrino, Danny Glover, and more. Since its publication in 1982, The Color Purple has resonated with generations of readers across the globe. The novel catapulted author Alice Walker to international fame, brought Oprah Winfrey and Whoopi Goldberg acting acclaim in the 1985 film adaptation, and inspired theatrical productions around the world, including the Tony Award–winning Broadway musical. This cultural touchstone—which so profoundly touches on race, family, survival, spirituality, sisterhood, and love in all forms—continues to beget new iterations, most recently a feature film. Now, an in-depth exploration celebrates The Color Purple's ever-expanding legacy as never before: Purple Rising features oral histories and fresh anecdotes based on more than fifty original interviews, as well as vibrant, never-before-seen images. It reveals the crucial real-life experiences that inspired the novel, and the transcendent humanity of its themes that continue to connect with audiences, each new adaptation speaking to the changing times and cultural contexts. Creators, actors, producers, activists, cultural critics, and well-known fans comment on the power of Walker's story and how it has affected their lives and artistic choices, including Whoopi Goldberg, Taraji P. Henson, Danielle Brooks, Halle Bailey, Blitz Bazawule, Jon Batiste, H.E.R., Salamishah Tillet, Ricky Dillard, Gabrielle Union, and many more. An insightful and vivid celebration of an enduring classic, Purple Rising is the ultimate gift for fans of all ages and a true celebration of Black joy, storytelling, and achievement.

Lise Funderburg (Author), Amir Abdullah, Daniel Henning, Eunice Wong, Janina Edwards, Joniece Abbott-Pratt, Karise Yansen, Kevin R. Free, Ramón De Ocampo (Narrator)

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Nubia: The Reckoning

The sequel to Nubia: The Awakening, the epic fantasy from actor and producer Omar Epps and writer Clarence A. Haynes! A powerful saga of three teens, the children of refugees from a fallen African utopia, who must navigate their newfound powers in a climate-ravaged New York City. Zuberi, Uzochi, and Lencho were among the first of a new generation of Nubians to awaken to extraordinary powers-gifts their parents lost when they fled their island home decades ago. And now that Uzochi has been declared a Nubian catalyst, everyone expects him to lead. But what should be a time of rebirth and celebration is instead one of turmoil. The so-called sky king, Krazen St. John, is bent on harnessing Nubian gifts for himself, and he has assembled a special, superhuman militia to do his bidding, putting a ruthless Lencho in charge. Facing down his cousin feels insurmountable for Uzochi, even with Zuberi at his side, but now there's more at stake than the hostile government of Tri-State East. Uzochi's training has led him to discover an ancient, forgotten force hungry for conquest-and it won't stop until all of Tri-State East . . . and possibly the world . . . is under its control.

Clarence A. Haynes, Omar Epps (Author), Amir Abdullah, Emana Rachelle, Jeorge Bennett Watson (Narrator)

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Democracies in America: Keywords for the 19th Century and Today

Ask someone their thoughts about 'democracy' and you'll get many different responses. Some may presume it a thing once established yet now under threat. Others may believe that democracy has always been compromised by the empowered few. In the contemporary United States, marked by constituencies across the political spectrum believing that their voices have gone unheard, 'democracy' gets wielded in so many divergent directions as to be rendered nearly incoherent. Democracies in America reminds us that this reality is nothing new. Focusing on the various meanings of 'democracy' that circulated in the nineteenth century, the book collects twenty-five essays, each taking up a keyword in the language we use to talk about democracy. The essays consider the relationship between 'America' and 'democracy' from multiple disciplinary angles and from different moments in a major historical period-amidst the vitality of the revolutionary epoch, in the contentious lead-up to the Civil War, and through the triumphs and failures of Reconstruction and the early reforms of the Progressive Era-while making both forward and backward glances in time. This volume cultivates, for students and teachers in classrooms, as well as citizens in libraries and cafes, a language to deliberate about the possibilities and problems of democracy in America.

D. Berton Emerson, Gregory Laski (Author), Amir Abdullah, James Babson, Kyla García, Lisa Larsen, Mia Ellis, Vyvy Nguyen (Narrator)

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Audiobooks Narrated by Amir Abdullah