Baltimore Writer D. Watkins: "We Speak for Ourselves: A Word from Forgotten Black America"

"We Speak for Ourselves: A Word from Forgotten Black America." That's the name of a new book by D. Watkins that amplifies the experiences of poor black Americans typically sidelined by the public and the media-including his own life story. He writes, "I'm from the bottom, and what I mean by bottom is first-generation scholars, the project babies, the people without Wi-Fi, the workers, the people most likely to get hit by police bullets. We are the subjects of protests, the rarely heard-from even as our deaths are debated by media personalities who wouldn't step foot on our blocks. " To quote the brilliant scholar and activist Dr. Su'ad Abdul Khabeer, 'You don't need to be a voice for the voiceless. Just pass the mic.'" D. Watkins is a professor at the University of Baltimore and founder of the BMORE Writers Project. He is also the author of "The Cook Up: A Crack Rock Memoir" and "The Beast Side: Living and Dying While Black in America."