I Am Not Your Negro

The future of the Negro in this country is precisely as bright or as dark as the future of the country. — James Baldwin

In the final years of his life, James Baldwin began writing Remember This House, a personal account of the lives and assassinations of three of his closest friends—Medgar Evers, Malcolm X, and Martin Luther King, Jr. Now, more than 30 years later, a new documentary picks up those letters and unfinished manuscripts to explore how race became the defining struggle of American society.

I Am Not Your Negro , an Academy Award-nominated film by Raoul Peck, is an up-to-the-minute examination of race in America. Using Baldwin's original words and a spellbinding flood of archival material, the film is a journey into the black history that connects the past of the Civil Rights Movement to the present of Black Lives Matter. Baldwin's legacy makes one thing clear: the piercing endurance of racism—and the very definition of what America stands for—remains as relevant as ever.

On the eve of its theatrical release, join New America NYC for a screening of I Am Not Your Negro and a conversation on how we can better face—and change—the racial divide in America.

PARTICIPANTS

Nikole Hannah-Jones @nhannahjones
Staff Writer, The New York Times Magazine
Emerson Fellow, New America

Aisha Karefa-Smart @afroculinista
Author and niece of James Baldwin

Jamil Smith @JamilSmith
Senior National Correspondent, MTV News