Join us at this year's Decatur Book Festival to celebrate the 2026 winners of the Lillian Smith Book Award! The Lillian Smith Book Awards recognize works that examine issues of race, social justice, civil and human rights, the education and socialization of young people, breaking silence among repressed groups, and matters that are significant to the changing South. This award ceremony is in partnership with the Southern Regional Council, University of Georgia Libraries, and DeKalb County Public Library’s Georgia Center for the Book.
The ceremony will take place on Saturday, October 3rd at 11:15am at the Decatur Library Auditorium.
The 2026 winners are Derek W. Black and Keisha N. Blain. Black’s Dangerous Learning: The South's Long War on Black Literacy shows how literacy evolved from a subversive gateway to freedom in the nineteenth century to a public program to extend citizenship and build democratic institutions. Blain’s Without Fear: Black Women and the Making of Human Rights is a necessary and bracing history of Black women’s critical role over the past two centuries in defining the concept of human rights.
This event is free and open to the public. No tickets are required, and seating is first come, first served.
A book signing will follow the ceremony at 12:30pm!