Misbehaving at the Crossroads

Winner of the Balcones Prize in Nonfiction Longlisted for the National Book Critics Circle award for Nonfiction The New York Times-bestselling, National Book Award-nominated author of The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois and The Age of Phillis makes her nonfiction debut with this personal and thought-provoking work that explores the journeys and possibilities of Black women throughout American history and in contemporary times. Honoree Fanonne Jeffers is at a crossroads. Traditional African/Black American cultures present the crossroads as a place of simultaneous difficulty and possibility. In contemporary times, Kimberle Crenshaw coined the phrase ';intersectionality' to explain the unique position of Black women in America. In many ways, they are at a third crossroads: attempting to fit into notions of femininity and respectability primarily assigned to White women, while inventing improvisational strategies to combat