Selected from a diverse array of respected publications such as the New Yorker, the Virginia Quarterly Review, Slate, and National Geographic, the essays gathered here are about making history, living everyday life--and everything in between. In "Fired," author and professor Emily Bernard wrestles with the pain of a friendship inexplicably ended. Kenneth McClane writes hauntingly of the last days of his parents' lives in "Driving." Journalist Brian Palmer shares "The Last Thoughts of an Iraq War Embed." Jamaica Kincaid describes her oddly charged relationship with that quintessentially British, Wordsworthian flower in "Dances with Daffodils," and writer Hawa Allan depicts the forces of race and rivalry as two catwalk icons face off in "When Tyra Met Naomi." A venue in which African American writers can branch out from traditionally "black" subjects, Best African American Essays features a range of gifted voices exploring the many issues and experiences, joys and trials, that, as human beings, we all share.

Introduction /Gerald Early -- Introduction / by Debra J. Dickerson -- Friends, family : Fired: can a friendship really end for no good reason? / by Emily Bernard -- Gray shawl / by Walter Mosley -- Real food / by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. Entertainment, sports, the arts : Hip-hop planet / by James McBride -- Writers like me / by Martha Southgate -- Dances with daffodils / by Jamaica Kincaid -- The coincidental cousins: a night out with artist Kara Walker / by James Hannaham -- Music: bodies in pain / by Mark Anthony Neal -- When Tyra met Naomi: race, fashion, and rivalry / by Hawa Allan -- Dancing in the dark: race, sex, the South, and exploitative cinema / by Gerald Early -- Modern-day mammy? / by Jill Nelson -- Broken dreams / by Michael A. Gonzales. Sciences, technology, education : None of the above: what I.Q. doesn't tell you about race / by Malcolm Gladwell -- Driving / by Kenneth A. McClane -- Part I: I had a dream / by Bill Maxwell -- Part II: A dream lay dying / by Bill Maxwell -- Part III: The once and future promise / by Bill Maxwell. Gay: Get out of my closet: can you be white and "On the down low"? / by Benoit Denizet-Lewis -- Girls to men: young lesbians in Brooklyn find that a thug's life gets them more women / by Chloé A. Hilliard. Internationally black: A slow emancipation / by Kwame Anthony Appiah -- Searching for Zion / by Emily Raboteau -- Last thoughts of an Iraq "embed" / by Brian Palmer -- Stop trying to "save" Africa / by Uzodinma Iweala -- We are Americans / by Jerald Walker. Activism/Politcal thought: Jena, O.J. and the jailing of black America / by Orlando Patterson -- One nation-- under God? / by Barack Obama -- Americans without Americanness: Is our nation nothing more than an address? / by John McWhorter -- Barack Obama / by Michael Eric Dyson -- Standing up for "bad" words / by Stephane Dunn -- Debunking "driving while black" myth / by Thomas Sowell -- Goodbye to all that: Why Obama matters / by Andrew Sullivan -- The high ground / by Stanley Crouch.