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She explored the history and culture of Africa, the West Indies and Europe in work that made her a perennial favorite for the Nobel Prize.

He spun gripping portraits of the Black experience starting in the 1960s with the seminal Harlem spoken-word collective, laying a foundation for what was to come.

He became wealthy working as a hairdresser in New York, then used his funds to free enslaved people, build churches and house orphans of color.

He popularized the term “institutional racism" and, with Stokely Carmichael, wrote a book in 1967 that was seen as a radical manifesto.

He collaborated on a textbook so unsparing in its review of the state’s grim past that it was barred from schools almost as soon as it appeared.

She got her start on Broadway at 15. But after finding a dearth of roles for Black women, she ultimately turned to one-woman shows that addressed racism and sexism.

He is best known for crawling along the entirety of Broadway in Manhattan wearing a Superman costume, a work that blended satire and resistance.