By Sikivu Hutchinson

One of the most popular images mainstream America has of black women is the bible-thumping, wise-cracking Madea, the now iconic flagship character of the multi-million dollar Tyler Perry movie empire.  According to the Pew Religion Research Forum 87% of African Americans are religious, making African Americans among the most religious communities in the U.S.  And the majority of those packing the pews and plumping up the collection plates are black women.  In my predominantly African American South Los Angeles neighborhood the most common personalized license plates are decidedly faith-based.  Fish icons, hands clasped in prayer, and church congregation names grace cars buffed to a blinding sheen.  For a variety of cultural and historical reasons, religion is central to black identity.  So how does a black female author go about writing, publishing and marketing a book on atheism and secular humanist morality? 

Atheism is a taboo subject in black communities.  It is a notion so foreign to mainstream African Americans that some equate it with devil worship.  Like many Americans, blacks reflexively associate morality with Christian beliefs. Mindful of this context, in 2009 I wrote a blog post called “Out of the Closet” that explored the marginalization of black non-believers.  It became something of an Internet sensation, and I received tons of supportive emails from non-believers of color hungry for greater visibility in the largely white-dominated world of New Atheism.  Bestselling white male authors like Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, and Christopher Hitchens had put atheism on the global map as a cultural and political force.  Still, there were only a few books by writers of color on the subject, and none by African American women.  And after sending my book prospectus, Moral Combat: Black Atheists, Gender Politics, and the Values Warsaround to small academic/scholarly publishers I received little to no interest.  Even though the publishing industry was in freefall, I was warned by my academic friends that self-publishing would be imprudent.  Ignoring their caution, I decided to set up my own imprint, Infidel Books, and publish through Createspace.  The explosion of social networking sites and online groups has given atheism an entirely new purchase in the information technology age, mitigating some of the anxiety that non-believers have dealing with their outsider status in real-time.  Sites like Atheist Nexus, Think Atheist and Atheist Universe have all provided non-believers with forums for dialogue and network building.  Over the past three years, this social networking vanguard has blossomed into advocacy groups across the United States.  These groups have buttressed established secular and atheist organizations steeped in church/state separation and science education issues.  As a result, I’ve been able to market and promote the book through speaking engagements and appearances with these organizations.  I’ve asked writer friends to post reviews of the book at cultural and literary websites.  I’ve also kept the book in the public eye by writing robust blog posts and articles on religion, politics, race, gender, and sexuality.  Publishing my blog posts at a variety of sites, maintaining a print presence in local black newspapers and national secular magazines, tapping into secular-oriented podcasts, radio shows, and video streams, in addition to continuing my advocacy around secular humanist issues nationally, has also increased the book’s visibility.  Social networking, blogging, press releases, and word of mouth about the uniqueness of Moral Combat have allowed me to capitalize on all of the “niche” sectors the book appeals to.

The book has been out for nearly a year and sales are building within humanist and atheist circles.  Yet, the greatest frontier will be reaching women for whom Jesus and the Lord are never far from their conversations and shifting mainstream consciousness about the morality of secular belief systems. 

Sikivu Hutchinson is the editor of blackfemlens.org and the author of Moral Combat: Black Atheists, Gender Politics, and the Values Wars.  Her forthcoming book is entitled Godless Americana: Race and Religious Rebels.