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Black Meme

A History of the Images that Make Us
By Legacy Russell
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Brief Description
Representations of Blackness have always been integral to our understanding of the modern world. In Black Meme, Legacy Russell, award-winning author of the groundbreaking Glitch Feminism, explores the construct, culture, and material of the “meme” as mapped to Black visual culture from 1900 to the present... Read More
Format: Paperback / softback
$2699
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A history of Black imagery that rewrites the history of visual culture and technology now by the bestselling author of Glitch Feminism

A history of Black imagery that rewrites the history of visual culture and technology now by the bestselling author of Glitch Feminism

Book Hero Magic formatted this description to make it easier to read. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! Description

Representations of Blackness have always been integral to our understanding of the modern world. In Black Meme, Legacy Russell, award-winning author of the groundbreaking Glitch Feminism, explores the construct, culture, and material of the “meme” as mapped to Black visual culture from 1900 to the present day. Mining both archival and contemporary media, Russell explores the impact of Blackness, Black life, and death on contemporary conceptions of viral culture, borne in the age of the internet.

These meditations include: the circulation of Lynching postcards; Jet Magazine’s publication of a picture of Emmett Till in his open casket; how the televised broadcast of protesters in Selma enters the nation’s living room and changed the debate on civil rights; how a citizen-recorded video of the Rodney King beating at the hands of the LAPD became known as the “first viral video”; what the Anita Hill hearings tell us about the media’s creation of the Black icon; Tamara Lanier’s fight to reclaim the photos of her enslaved ancestors, Renty and Delia, from Harvard’s archive; the Facebook Live recording by Lavish “Diamond” Reynolds of the murder of her partner Philando Castile by the police after being stopped for a broken tail light; and more.

Legacy Russell explores the power of these tokens and argues that without the contributions of Black people, digital culture would not exist in its current form.

Book Details

INFORMATION

ISBN: 9781839762819

Publisher: Verso Books

Format: Paperback / softback

Date Published: 15 September 2026

Country: United Kingdom

Imprint: Verso Books

Illustration: 16pp colour plate section

Audience: General / adult

DIMENSIONS

Spine width: 13.0mm

Width: 129.0mm

Height: 198.0mm

Weight: 186g

Pages: 192

Collections

Arts & Culture Biography & Memoir Computing & Technology Education & Reference Legacy Russell Non-Fiction Non-Fiction Pre-Orders Pre-order Books Pre-orders Pre-orders by Release Date

About the Author

Legacy Russell is a curator and writer. Born and raised in New York City, she is the Executive Director & Chief Curator at The Kitchen. Formerly she was the Associate Curator of Exhibitions at The Studio Museum in Harlem. Russell holds an MRes with Distinction in Art History from Goldsmiths, University of London with a focus in Visual Culture. Her academic, curatorial, and creative work focuses on gender, performance, digital selfdom, internet idolatry, and new media ritual. Russell's written work, interviews, and essays have been published internationally. She is the recipient of the Thoma Foundation 2019 Arts Writing Award in Digital Art, a 2020 Rauschenberg Residency Fellow, and a recipient of the 2021 Creative Capital Award. Her first book Glitch Feminism: A Manifesto (2020) is published by Verso Books. Her second book, BLACK MEME, is forthcoming via Verso Books.

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