Modern HERstory

About Modern HERstory

Modern HERstory: Stories of Women and Nonbinary People Rewriting History is a nonfiction book by Blair Imani, illustrated by Monique Le, published in 2018 by Ten Speed Press. The book profiles seventy women, girls, and nonbinary people who have contributed to social movements from the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 1960s through Stonewall, the AIDS crisis, the emergence of Black Lives Matter, the Standing Rock protests, and the fight for LGBTQ+ rights in the contemporary United States.

Each profile is paired with vibrant full-color illustrations by Monique Le, whose artwork depicts the subjects in a style that is celebratory and immediate. The visual approach makes the book accessible to younger readers while giving older readers an entry point through image before text. Subjects include Rosa Parks, Marsha P. Johnson, Dolores Huerta, Sylvia Rivera, Malala Yousafzai, and dozens of less widely known activists and organizers whose contributions to social change are rarely covered in school curricula.

Imani, a Muslim, queer, Black educator and activist, brings her own perspective to the selections — centering figures who are often erased from mainstream historical narratives, particularly those who are Black, LGBTQ+, or from communities of color. The book's explicit goal is to tell a version of American and global activist history that looks different from the one in most textbooks.

Whose Stories Are Told

The book's inclusion of LGBTQ+ figures — including Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera, two transgender women of color who were central to the Stonewall riots — along with its treatment of nonbinary identity and its coverage of contemporary movements like Black Lives Matter, makes it a target in districts seeking to limit LGBTQ+ content in school materials. Several profiles address queer identity directly as part of a subject's biography and activism.

The framing of "herstory" — the deliberate rewriting of "history" to center women and nonbinary people — is itself a political act, one that some challengers have cited as evidence that the book is ideologically motivated rather than educational. Supporters argue that recovering erased narratives is the work of honest history.

Challenges and Book Removals

Modern HERstory has been challenged in school libraries primarily for its inclusion of LGBTQ+ content — specifically the profiles of transgender and nonbinary activists and the book's matter-of-fact treatment of queer identity as a positive force in social movements. In some cases the book has been removed from elementary and middle school libraries as part of broader sweeps targeting LGBTQ+-inclusive materials.

Educators and librarians who support keeping the book on shelves point to its utility as a gateway to social history for younger readers, its diverse range of subjects, and its role in making visible the contributions of people who shaped American life and are rarely credited for it.