1. The Sheriff’s Children by Charles W. Chesnutt
It is a non-dialect short story focused on the moral decision a sheriff must make when he meets his mulatto son. The story suggests race questions are not only national but also personal, not only of concern to blacks but also to whites.
2. Recitatif by Toni Morrison
It is the Nobel Prize winning African-American novelist’s only published short story. It is about the conflicted friendship between two girls — one black and one white — from the time they meet and bond at age eight while staying at an orphanage through their re-acquaintance as mothers on different sides of economic, political, and racial divides in a town in upstate New York.
3. One Friday Morning by Langston Hughes
Nancy Lee, a black high school senior who aspires to become an artist. She encounters racial discrimination in her pursuit of dream but eventually impresses the school staff by her special perspective of beauty.