Black Boys Like Me

On Race, Identity, and Belonging

By: Matthew R. Morris

Narrated by: Matthew R. Morris

*INSTANT NATIONAL BESTSELLER*

*LONGLISTED FOR THE TORONTO BOOK AWARD*

“Black Boys Like Me ignited parts of me I honestly didn't believe any book could ever know. . . . Seldom do incredibly titled books earn their titles. Matthew R. Morris earns this classic title with a classic book about our insides.”—Kiese Laymon, author of Heavy

Startlingly honest, bracing personal essays from a perceptive educator that bring us into the world of Black masculinity, hip-hop culture, and learning.

This is an examination of the parts that construct my Black character; from how public schooling shapes our ideas about ourselves to how hip-hop and sports are simultaneously the conduit for both Black abundance and Black boundaries. This book is a meditation on the influences that have shaped Black boys like me.

What does it mean to be a young Black man with an immigrant father and a white mother, teaching in a school system that historically has held an exclusionary definition of success?

In eight illuminating essays, Matthew R. Morris grapples with this question, and others related to identity and perception. After graduating high school in Scarborough, Morris spent four years in the U.S. on multiple football scholarships and, having spent that time in the States experiencing “the Mecca of hip hop and Black culture,” returned home with a newfound perspective.

Now an elementary school teacher himself in Toronto, Morris explores the tension between his consumption of Black culture as a child, his teenage performances of the ideas and values of the culture that often betrayed his identity, and the ways society and the people guiding him—his parents, coaches, and teachers—received those performances. What emerges is a painful journey toward transcending performance altogether, toward true knowledge of the self.

With the wide-reaching scope of Desmond Cole’s The Skin We’re In and the introspective snapshot of life in Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates, Black Boys Like Me is an unflinching debut that invites readers to create braver spaces and engage in crucial conversations around race and belonging.

©2024 Matthew R. Morris (P)2024 Viking

Critic reviews

CBC's Top Nonfiction Pick for Spring 2024

One of:

CBC's “19 Canadian books to check out during Black History Month 2024”

Zoomer’s “8 Books For Black History Month”

“[A] fascinating look into the inspiration, motivation, challenges and reflections of a teacher . . . really powerful.”—Amanda Parris, CBC

“Black Boys Like Me ignited parts of me I honestly didn't believe any book could ever know. The language, and all its frequencies, pulses and settles in ways reminiscent of the first time I read bell hooks. Seldom do incredibly titled books earn their titles. Matthew R. Morris earns this classic title with a classic book about our insides.”—Kiese Laymon, author of Heavy

“In visceral and compelling prose, Morris illuminates the myriad layers of racial identity and the tenacity of internalized racism. Gorgeously written, Black Boys Like Me is a must-read for understanding both the big and little Rs of racism and how it implicates all of us in different ways, relative to our positions within it.”—Dr. Robin DiAngelo, New York Times bestselling author of White Fragility and Nice Racism