The following is a press release from the NAACP Image Awards:
The winners of the 49th NAACP Image Awards were announced on January 15, 2018, during the live broadcast from the Pasadena Civic Auditorium which aired on TV One (see complete winners list below). The two-hour live special was hosted by Anthony Anderson and opened with a powerful moment in support of #TIMESUP featuring Angela Robinson, Kerry Washington, Jurnee Smollett-Bell, Laverne Cox, Lena Waithe and Tracee Ellis Ross. There was a live pre-show from the red carpet hosted by Terrence J with special correspondent, Tanika Ray.
Ava DuVernay was honored as the NAACP Entertainer of the Year. NAACP Chairman Leon W. Russell presented the NAACP Chairman’s Award to William Lucy, NAACP President and CEO Derrick Johnson presented the NAACP President’s Award to Danny Glover and several members of the Memphis Sanitation “I Am A Man” Workers were also in attendance – they were presented with the NAACP Vanguard Award earlier in the week during a press conference at the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis, TN. Charlie Wilson was honored with the Music Makes a Difference honor which is bestowed upon an individual within the recording industry who has achieved worthwhile success and inspiration for civic engagement, criminal justice, education, economic opportunity, or criminal justice.
In addition, some of the biggest names in film, television and music appeared in the LIVE telecast including: Sterling K. Brown, Halle Berry, Mary J. Blige, Michael B. Jordan, Daniel Kaluuya, Issae Rae, Mandy Moore, Chadwick Boseman, Terry Crews, Tracee Ellis Ross, Yara Shahidi, Angela Rye, Danai Gurira, Isaiah Washington, Jacob Latimore, Jay Pharoah, Jemele Hill, Josh Gad, Loretta Devine, Meta Golding, Michael Smith, Tyler James Williams, Omari Hardwick, Ava DuVernay, Jurnee Smollett-Bell, Chris Sullivan, Sonequa Martin-Green, Judge Greg Mathis and Mike Colter.
The 49th NAACP Image Awards production team included Executive Producers Reginald Hudlin and Phil Gurin, Tony McCuin as Director, Byron Phillips as Producer, and Robin Reinhardt as Talent Producer.
The winners of the 49th NAACP Image Awards in the non-televised categories were announced during a gala dinner celebration that took place Sunday, January 14, 2018, at the Pasadena Conference Center – the event was hosted by The Real’s Adrienne Houghton, Loni Love, Jeannie Mai and Tamera Mowry-Housley.
The NAACP Image Awards is the premiere multicultural awards show. It celebrates the accomplishments of people of color in the fields of television, music, literature and film, and also honors individuals or groups who promote social justice through creative endeavors.
Nominees for the NAACP Image Awards are determined by the number of entries received by the deadline. To be eligible, projects must have had a national distribution date between January 1, 2017, and December 31, 2017. From those entries, a nominating committee selects five nominees in each of the 56 categories. To determine the winners, the members of the NAACP vote via a secured online site. The results are tabulated by the Image Awards auditors, Bert Smith & Co., and the results are confidential until the envelope is opened LIVE on stage during the TV One telecast.
For all information and the latest news, check back with us often here at the official NAACP Image Awards website, NAACPImageAwards.net.
“In It To Win It” – Charlie Wilson (RCA Records/P Music Group)
“Strength of A Woman” – Mary J. Blige (Capitol Records)
LITERATURE
Outstanding Literary Work – Fiction
“Little Fires Everywhere” – Celeste Ng (Penguin Random House)
“No One Is Coming to Save Us” – Stephanie Powell Watts (HarperCollins Publishers)
“Sing, Unburied, Sing” – Jesmyn Ward (Simon and Schuster)
“The Annotated African American Folktales” – Henry Louis Gates Jr. (Author), Maria Tatar (Author) (Liveright Publishing Corporation)
“The Wide Circumference of Love” – Marita Golden (Skyhorse Publishing, Inc.)
Outstanding Literary Work – Non-Fiction
“Black Detroit – A People’s History of Self-Determination” – Herb Boyd (HarperCollins Publishers)
“Chokehold: Policing Black Men” – Paul Butler (The New Press)
“Defining Moments in Black History: Reading Between the Lies” – Dick Gregory (HarperCollins Publishers)*
“The President’s Kitchen Cabinet: The Story of the African Americans Who Have Fed Our First Families, from the Washingtons to the Obamas” – Adrian Miller (University of North Carolina Press)
“We Were Eight Years In Power: An American Tragedy” – Ta-Nehisi Coates (Random House)
Outstanding Literary Work – Debut Author
“A Beautiful Ghetto” – Devin Allen (Haymarket Books)
“Chasing Spaces: An Astronaut’s Story of Grit, Grace & Second Chances” – Leland Melvin (HarperCollins Publishers)
“No One Is Coming to Save Us” – Stephanie Powell Watts (HarperCollins Publishers)*
“Rabbit: The Autobiography of Ms. Pat” – Patricia Williams (Author) Jeannine Amber (With) (HarperCollins Publishers)
“We’re Going to Need More Wine” – Gabrielle Union (HarperCollins Publishers)
Outstanding Literary Work – Instructional
“Ballerina Body: Dancing and Eating Your Way to a Leaner, Stronger, and More Graceful You” – Misty Copeland (Grand Central Publishing)
“Exponential Living – Stop Spending 100% of Your Time on 10% of Who You Are” – Sheri Riley (Author), Usher (Foreword By) (Penguin Random House)
“Notoriously Dapper – How to Be A Modern Gentleman with Manners, Style and Body Confidence” – Kelvin Davis (Mango Media Inc.)
“The Awakened Woman: Remembering & Reigniting Our Sacred Dreams” – Dr. Tererai Trent (Author), Oprah Winfrey (Foreword By) (Simon and Schuster)*
Outstanding Literary Work – Poetry
“Incendiary Art: Poems” – Patricia Smith (TriQuarterly Books/Northwestern University Press)*
“My Mother Was a Freedom Fighter” – Aja Monet (Haymarket Books)
“Silencer” – Marcus Wicker (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)
“The Drowning Boy’s Guide to Water” – Cameron Barnett (Autumn House Press)
“Wild Beauty: New and Selected Poems” – Ntozake Shange (Simon and Schuster)
Outstanding Literary Work – Children
“Becoming Kareem: Growing Up On and Off the Court” – Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (Author), Raymond Obstfeld (With) (Hachette Book Group)
“Before She Was Harriet” – Lesa Cline-Ransome (Author), James E. Ransome (Illustrator) (Holiday House)
“Little Leaders: Bold Women in Black History” – Vashti Harrison (Hachette Book Group)*
“Take a Picture of Me, James VanDerZee!” – Andrea J. Loney (Author), Keith Mallett (Illustrator) (Lee & Low Books)
“The Youngest Marcher: The Story of Audrey Faye Hendricks, A Young Civil Rights Activist” – Cynthia Levinson (Author), Vanessa Brantley-Newton (Illustrator) (S&S Children’s Publishing)
Outstanding Literary Work – Youth / Teens
“Allegedly” – Tiffany D. Jackson (HarperCollins Publishers)
Loretta Devine – “Doc McStuffins” (Disney Channel)
Tiffany Haddish – “Legends of Chamberlain Heights” (Comedy Central)*
Yvette Nicole Brown – “Elena of Avalor” (Disney Junior)
About NAACP:
Founded in 1909, the NAACP is the nation’s oldest and largest nonpartisan civil rights organization. Its members throughout the United States and the world are the premier advocates for civil rights in their communities. Read more about the NAACP’s work and our six “Game Changer” issue areas at NAACP.org.
About TV One:
Launched in January 2004, TV One serves 59 million households, offering a broad range of real-life and entertainment-focused original programming, classic series, movies and music designed to entertain and inform a diverse audience of adult black viewers. The network represents the best in black culture and entertainment with fan favorite shows Unsung, Rickey Smiley For Real, Fatal Attraction, The Manns and The NAACP Image Awards. In addition, TV One is the cable home of blockbuster drama Empire, and NewsOne Now, the only live daily news program dedicated to black viewers. In December 2008, the company launched TV One High Def, which now serves 14 million households. TV One is solely owned by Urban One, Inc., formerly known as Radio One, Inc. [NASDAQ: UONE and UONEK, www.urban1.com], the largest African-American owned multi-media company primarily targeting Black and urban audiences.
For more information about TV One, viewers can join the conversation by visiting the network’s companion website at www.tvone.tv<http://www.tvone.tv>>. TV One viewers can also join the conversation by connecting via social media on Twitter<https://twitter.com/TVONETV>, Instagram<https://www.instagram.com/tvonetv/> and Facebook<https://www.facebook.com/tvonetv>.