Activists & Politicians
- Theodore Roosevelt: Theodore Roosevelt Jr., often referred to as Teddy or by his initials, T. R., was an American politician, statesman, conservationist, naturalist, and writer who served as the 26th president of the United States from 1901 to 1909.
- Malala Yousafzai: Malala Yousafzai is a Pakistani female education activist and the 2014 Nobel Peace Prize laureate at the age of 17. She is the world's youngest Nobel Prize laureate, the second Pakistani and the first Pashtun to receive a Nobel Prize.
- Rigoberta Menchú: Rigoberta Menchú Tum is a K'iche' Guatemalan human rights activist, feminist, and Nobel Peace Prize laureate. Menchú has dedicated her life to publicizing the rights of Guatemala's Indigenous peoples during and after the Guatemalan Civil War, and to promoting Indigenous rights internationally.
- Liu Xiaobo: Liu Xiaobo was a Chinese literary critic, human rights activist, philosopher and Nobel Peace Prize laureate who called for political reforms and was involved in campaigns to end communist one-party rule in China.
- Cesar Chavez: Cesar Chavez was an American labor leader and civil rights activist. Along with Dolores Huerta, he co-founded the National Farm Workers Association, which later merged with the Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee to become the United Farm Workers labor union.
- John Lewis: John Robert Lewis (February 21, 1940 – July 17, 2020) was an American politician and civil rights activist who served in the United States House of Representatives for Georgia's 5th congressional district from 1987 until his death in 2020. He participated in the 1960 Nashville sit-ins, the Freedom Rides, was the chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) from 1963 to 1966, and was one of the "Big Six" leaders of groups who organized the 1963 March on Washington.
- Martha P. Johnson: Marsha P. Johnson was an American gay liberation activist and self-identified drag queen. Known as an outspoken advocate for gay rights, Johnson was one of the prominent figures in the Stonewall uprising of 1969.
- Nelson Mandela: Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela was a South African anti-apartheid activist and politician who served as the first president of South Africa from 1994 to 1999. He was the country's first black head of state and the first elected in a fully representative democratic election.
- Temple Grandin: Mary Temple Grandin is an American academic and animal behaviorist. She is a prominent proponent of the humane treatment of livestock for slaughter and the author of more than 60 scientific papers on animal behavior.
- Yusef Salaam: Yusef Salaam is an American politician, motivational speaker, and activist serving as a member for New York City's 9th City Council district since 2024. A member of the Democratic Party, Salaam was one of the Central Park Five who were wrongfully convicted of raping a woman in Central Park in 1989.
- X González: X González is an American activist and advocate for gun control. In 2018, they survived the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting, the deadliest high school shooting in U.S. history, and, in response, co-founded the gun-control advocacy group Never Again MSD.
- Angela Davis: Angela Yvonne Davis is an American Marxist and feminist political activist, philosopher, academic, and author; she is a professor at the University of California, Santa Cruz. Davis was a longtime member of the Communist Party USA and a founding member of the Committees of Correspondence for Democracy and Socialism.
- Harvey Milk: Harvey Bernard Milk was an American politician and the first openly gay man to be elected to public office in California, as a member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors.
- Tarana Burke: Tarana Burke is an American activist from New York City, who started the MeToo movement. In 2006, Burke began using MeToo to help other women with similar experiences to stand up for themselves.
- Cierra Fields: Cierra Fields is an anti-rape activist, Native American community health activist, and member of the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma. Fields worked as a freelance journalist for Indian Country Today Media Network.
- Golda Meir: Golda Meir was an Israeli politician who served as the fourth prime minister of Israel from 1969 to 1974. She was Israel's first and only female head of government and the first female head of government in the Middle East.
- Raffi Freedman-Gurspan: Raffi Freedman-Gurspan is an Honduran American transgender rights activist and the first openly transgender person to work as a White House staffer. She was also the first openly transgender legislative staffer to work in the Massachusetts House of Representatives.
- Judith Heumann: Judith Ellen "Judy" Heumann was an American disability rights activist, known as the "Mother of the Disability Rights Movement". She was recognized internationally as a leader in the disability community. Heumann was a lifelong civil rights advocate for people with disabilities.
- Sandra Lawson: Sandra Lawson is a rabbi and the first Director of Racial Diversity, Equity and Inclusion at Reconstructing Judaism. She previously served as Associate Chaplain for Jewish Life at Elon University. Lawson became the first openly gay, female, and black rabbi in the world in 2018.
|
Artists
- Frida Kahlo: Magdalena Carmen Frida Kahlo y Calderón was a Mexican painter known for her many portraits, self-portraits, and works inspired by the nature and artifacts of Mexico.
- Diego Rivera: Diego María de la Concepción Juan Nepomuceno Estanislao de la Rivera y Barrientos Acosta y Rodríguez, known as Diego Rivera, was a prominent Mexican painter. His large frescoes helped establish the mural movement in Mexican and international art.
- Jean-Michel Basquiat: Jean-Michel Basquiat was an American artist who rose to success during the 1980s as part of the Neo-expressionism movement.
- Keith Haring: Keith Allen Haring was an American artist whose pop art emerged from the New York City graffiti subculture of the 1980s. His animated imagery has "become a widely recognized visual language.
- John Heartfield: John Heartfield was a 20th-century German visual artist who pioneered the use of art as a political weapon. Some of his most famous photomontages were anti-Nazi and anti-fascist statements.
- Aaron Douglas: Aaron Douglas was an American painter, illustrator and visual arts educator. He was a major figure in the Harlem Renaissance. He developed his art career painting murals and creating illustrations that addressed social issues around race and segregation in the United States by utilizing African-centric imagery.
- Shamsia Hassani: Shamsia Hassani is an Afghani street artist, a fine arts lecturer, and the associate professor of Drawing and Anatomy Drawing at the Kabul University.
- Jacob Lawrence: Jacob Armstead Lawrence was an American painter known for his portrayal of African-American historical subjects and contemporary life. Lawrence referred to his style as "dynamic cubism," an art form popularized in Europe which drew great inspiration from West African and Meso-American art.
- Edvard Munch: Edvard Munch was a Norwegian painter. His 1893 work, The Scream, has become one of Western art's most acclaimed images. His childhood was overshadowed by illness, bereavement and the dread of inheriting a mental condition that ran in the family.
- Vincent Van Gogh: Vincent Willem van Gogh was a Dutch Post-Impressionist painter who is among the most famous and influential figures in the history of Western art. In just over a decade he created approximately 2100 artworks, including around 860 oil paintings, most of them in the last two years of his life.
|
Sports
- Colin Kaepernick: Colin Rand Kaepernick is a former American football quarterback and American civil rights activist. He played six seasons for the San Francisco 49ers in the National Football League.
- Perry Wallace was the first African-American varsity athlete to play basketball under an athletic scholarship in the Southeastern Conference, playing for Vanderbilt University
- Serena Williams is an American former professional tennis player.
- Jackie Robinson was an American professional baseball player who became the first African American to play in Major League Baseball
- Leland Melvin played in the NFL and is American engineer and a NASA astronaut.
|
Musicians
- Tupac Shakur: Tupac Amaru Shakur, also known by his stage names 2Pac and Makaveli, was an American rapper. He is widely considered one of the most influential and successful rappers of all time. Shakur is among the best-selling music artists, having sold more than 75 million records worldwide.
- Josephine Baker: Freda Josephine Baker, naturalized as Joséphine Baker, was an American-born French dancer, singer and actress. Her career was centered primarily in Europe, mostly in France.
|
Writers
- Audre Lorde: Audre Lorde was an American writer, professor, philosopher, intersectional feminist, poet and civil rights activist.
- Maya Angelou: Maya Angelou was an American memoirist, poet, and civil rights activist. She published seven autobiographies, three books of essays, several books of poetry, and is credited with a list of plays, movies, and television shows spanning over 50 years. She received dozens of awards and more than 50 honorary degrees.
- Khaled Hosseini: Khaled Hosseini is an Afghan-American novelist, UNHCR goodwill ambassador, and former physician. His debut novel The Kite Runner was a critical and commercial success; the book and his subsequent novels have all been at least partially set in Afghanistan and have featured an Afghan as the protagonist.
- Ta-Nehisi Coates: Ta-Nehisi Paul Coates is an American author, journalist, and activist. He gained a wide readership during his time as national correspondent at The Atlantic, where he wrote about cultural, social, and political issues, particularly regarding African Americans and white supremacy.
- Marjane Satrapi: Marjane Satrapi is a French-Iranian graphic novelist, cartoonist, illustrator, film director, and children's book author. Her best-known works include the graphic novel Persepolis and its film adaptation, the graphic novel Chicken with Plums, Woman, Life, Freedom and the Marie Curie biopic Radioactive
- Fred Aceves: Fred Aceves is the author of The Closest I've Come, which was an ALA/YALSA Best Fiction for Young Adults selection, a Kirkus Reviews Best Books of the Year selection, and an NYPL Best Books selection.
|
Film & Media
- Ai Weiwei: Ai Weiwei is a Chinese contemporary artist, documentarian, and activist. Ai grew up in the far northwest of China, where he lived under harsh conditions due to his father's exile. As an activist, he has been openly critical of the Chinese Government's stance on democracy and human rights.
- Paola Mendoza: Paola Mendoza is a film director, activist, author, and artist. In 2017, she co-founded and served as the artistic director for the 2017 Women's March.
- Marcus Samuelsson: Marcus Samuelsson is an Ethiopian-born Swedish-American celebrity chef, restaurateur and television personality. He is the head chef of Red Rooster in Harlem, New York.
- RuPaul: RuPaul Andre Charles is an American drag queen, television personality, actor, singer, producer, and writer.
- Michael J. Fox: Michael Andrew Fox OC, known professionally as Michael J. Fox, is a Canadian and American activist and retired actor. Beginning his career as a child actor in the 1970s, he rose to prominence portraying Alex P. Keaton on the NBC sitcom Family Ties and Marty McFly in the Back to the Future film trilogy.
|
This link opens in a new window