LUPITA NYONG’O’S BOOK SULWE ON NEW YORK TIMES BEST SELLER AGAIN

Academy Award winning actress Lupita Nyong’o’s picture book Sulwe is on the New York Times best seller again.

The actress announced on social media, “This week #Sulwe featured on the @NYTimes and Indie Bestseller lists again, a direct result of people recommending it as a tool to teach children about the complexities of race and racism.

I feel proud and very moved that my work is proving useful at this time, as we work toward combating the beast that is racism. Racism is as real as the wetness of water. Period.

But unlike water, we can and must do away with it. It wreaks havoc in our societies and in our minds, bodies and spirits. I wrote Sulwe to help stave off the damage that can be done when we internalize racial prejudice against our own dark complexions.

When we exercise preferential treatment of people based on the color of their skin and its proximity to whiteness, that’s called colorism. And colorism is just as reprehensible as its mother, racism. Let’s do away with both! ¡Punto y aparte!”

The book has so far received two awards, a Coretta Scott King Illustrator Honor Award and an NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Children’s Literary Work.