Review
An informative, sometimes indelicately gossipy backstage story ... Most valuable are inspirational interviews with numerous leading black journalists [including Les Payne, Chuck Stone, and Jeannye Thornton], whose stories testify to both their determination and the obstacles minority journalists confront. --American Journalism Review, Nov. 1993
Dawkins is faithful to his purpose: to capture the stories of NABJ's past and to preserve those events for others. -- American Journalism magazine, Winter 1995
Dawkins provides an especially good account of NABJ dilemmas and paranoia ... needed addition to the literature of media history. -- AJ Book Reviews, Fall 1996
Dawkins' book contains amusing anecdotes. The first fundraiser almost bankrupted the group...James Baldwin showed up with an entourage. -- The New York Sun, July 26, 2005
This book is a welcome addition to the literature on blacks and the media, but there is still more to do on the topic. ... Within the context of the period covered, Dawkins does a very good job of showing how it was not always smooth sailing for NABJ, particularly the early years. Dawkins tells readers of the personality conflicts, factional [e.g. print vs. broadcast, urban vs. smaller markets] disputes, and failed and successful grabs for power during this period of the organization's adolescence. ... In summary, "Black Journalists" is a needed addition to the literature of media history, but readers should be reminded it is "a" story of the National Association of Black Journalists and not the whole one. --AJ Book Reviews, Fall 1996
Wayne Dawkins' book on the National Association of Black Journalists answers one critical question for those who have observed the group over the years: If the organization is supposed to have begun so small that the first meeting could have been held in a phone booth, how can so many people claim to be founders? The answer is that on 12 December 1975, 44 journalists in Washington, D.C. founded what has become the largest organization of journalists of color in this nation. ... Dawkins traces NABJ through the 1983 convention, the first year in which the board did not have a founder. By then the group had grown to more than 400. [For the 1994 Unity convention, NABJ registered more than 3,000 participants]... Dawkins is faithful to his purpose: to capture the stories of NABJ's past and to preserve those events for younger journalists and others. --American Journalism, Winter 1995
Dawkins is faithful to his purpose: to capture the stories of NABJ's past and to preserve those events for others. -- American Journalism magazine, Winter 1995
Dawkins provides an especially good account of NABJ dilemmas and paranoia ... needed addition to the literature of media history. -- AJ Book Reviews, Fall 1996
Dawkins' book contains amusing anecdotes. The first fundraiser almost bankrupted the group...James Baldwin showed up with an entourage. -- The New York Sun, July 26, 2005
This book is a welcome addition to the literature on blacks and the media, but there is still more to do on the topic. ... Within the context of the period covered, Dawkins does a very good job of showing how it was not always smooth sailing for NABJ, particularly the early years. Dawkins tells readers of the personality conflicts, factional [e.g. print vs. broadcast, urban vs. smaller markets] disputes, and failed and successful grabs for power during this period of the organization's adolescence. ... In summary, "Black Journalists" is a needed addition to the literature of media history, but readers should be reminded it is "a" story of the National Association of Black Journalists and not the whole one. --AJ Book Reviews, Fall 1996
Wayne Dawkins' book on the National Association of Black Journalists answers one critical question for those who have observed the group over the years: If the organization is supposed to have begun so small that the first meeting could have been held in a phone booth, how can so many people claim to be founders? The answer is that on 12 December 1975, 44 journalists in Washington, D.C. founded what has become the largest organization of journalists of color in this nation. ... Dawkins traces NABJ through the 1983 convention, the first year in which the board did not have a founder. By then the group had grown to more than 400. [For the 1994 Unity convention, NABJ registered more than 3,000 participants]... Dawkins is faithful to his purpose: to capture the stories of NABJ's past and to preserve those events for younger journalists and others. --American Journalism, Winter 1995
Product Description
Wayne Dawkins gives an insider's account of the battling egos, valiant efforts and controversies that went into creating the National Association of Black Journalists, the largest and most powerful organization of journalists of color in America. The critically acclaimed book also recounts the struggles that have sustained and strengthened the group as it has grown and prospered.
