Without Fear tells how, during American history, Black women made human rights theirs: from worldwide travel and public advocacy in the global Black press to their work for the United Nations, they courageously and effectively moved human rights beyond an esoteric concept to an active, organizing principle.
 
Acclaimed historian Keisha N. Blain tells the story of these women—from the well-known, like Ida B. Wells, Madam C. J. Walker, and Lena Horne, to those who are still less known, including Pearl Sherrod, Aretha McKinley, and Marguerite Cartwright. Blain captures human rights thinking and activism from the ground up with Black women at the center, working outside the traditional halls of power. 

By shouldering intersecting forms of oppression—including racism, sexism, and classism—Black women have long been in a unique position to fight for freedom and dignity. Without Fear is an account of their aspirations, strategies, and struggles to pioneer a human rights approach to combating systems of injustice.

Keisha N. Blain is a historian and professor at Brown University. She is a Guggenheim, Carnegie, and New America Fellow and a New York Times bestselling author. She has published eight books, including the multi-prize-winning book Set the World on Fire: Black Nationalist Women and the Global Struggle for Freedom (2018); and the National Book Critics Circle Award finalist Until I Am Free: Fannie Lou Hamer's Enduring Message to America (2021). Her latest book, Without Fear: Black Women and the Making of Human Rights (W.W. Norton, 2025), offers a sweeping history of human rights framed by the work and ideas of Black women in the United States from the early nineteenth century to the present.

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