Third World Press is the largest independent black

African American

African Americans are citizens or residents of the United States who have at least partial ancestry from any of the native populations of Sub-Saharan Africa and are the direct descendants of enslaved Africans within the boundaries of the present United States...

-owned press in the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

.

In December 1967, Haki R. Madhubuti

Haki R. Madhubuti

Haki R. Madhubuti is a renowned African-American author, educator, and poet. He received a Master of Fine Arts degree from the Iowa Writers' Workshop at the University of Iowa, and served in the U.S...

 met with poet and activist Carolyn Rodgers

Carolyn Rodgers

Carolyn Marie Rodgers was a Chicago-based American poet and a founder of one of America’s oldest and largest black presses, Third World Press...

 and Johari Amini in the basement of a South Side apartment in Chicago

Chicago

Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...

 to found Third World Press, an outlet for African-American literature. By 2007, the company continued to thrive in a multi-million dollar facility. Over the years, Third World Press has published works by Pulitzer Prize winning

Pulitzer Prize for Poetry

The Pulitzer Prize in Poetry has been presented since 1922 for a distinguished volume of original verse by an American author. However, special citations for poetry were presented in 1918 and 1919.-Winners:...

 author Gwendolyn Brooks

Gwendolyn Brooks

Gwendolyn Elizabeth Brooks was an American poet. She was appointed Poet Laureate of Illinois in 1968 and Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress in 1985.-Biography:...

, as well as Sonia Sanchez

Sonia Sanchez

Sonia Sanchez is an African American poet most often associated with the Black Arts Movement. She has authored over a dozen books of poetry, as well as plays and children's books...

, Sterling Plump and Pearl Cleage.
The publisher has focused on publishing culturally progressive and political works of fiction and non-fiction, poetry, and cross-genre work. The list of authors published by Third World Press include (besides Brooks and Sanchez) Amiri Baraka

Amiri Baraka

Amiri Baraka , formerly known as LeRoi Jones, is an American writer of poetry, drama, fiction, essays, and music criticism...

, Margaret Walker

Margaret Walker

Margaret Abigail Walker Alexander was an African-American poet and writer. Born in Birmingham, Alabama, she wrote as Margaret Walker. One of her best-known poems is For My People.-Biography:...

, Sam Greenlee

Sam Greenlee

Sam Greenlee is an African American writer, best known for his novel The Spook Who Sat by the Door, first published in London by Allison & Busby in March 1969, which was made into the 1973 movie of the same name and won The Sunday Times Book of the Year award...

, Mari Evans

Mari Evans

Mari Evans is an African-American poet, living in Indianapolis.-Education and Employment:Evans attended the University of Toledo where she majored in fashion design in 1939. The fashion design major did not hold her interest and she left the University of Toledo without a degree...

 and George E. Kent

George E. Kent

George E. Kent was an African-American professor of literature, with a specialization in Afro-American literature.-Early life and education:...

In 2006, The Covenant With Black America, with introduction by Tavis Smiley

Tavis Smiley

Tavis Smiley is a talk show host, author, liberal political commentator, entrepreneur, advocate and philanthropist. Smiley was born in Gulfport, Mississippi and grew up in Kokomo, Indiana. After attending Indiana University, he worked during the late 1980s as an aide to Tom Bradley, the mayor of...

, reached No. 1 in the New York Times Bestseller list.
In May 2011, Third World Press developed and launched TWPBooks.com, which replaced the former ThirdWorldPressInc.com. TWPBooks.com leverages the heritage and technological spirit that Third World Press has come to be known for. Under the direction of Haki R. Madhudbuti, Third World Press has embraced social media and the prevalence of eBooks all while upgrading its internal technologies to better serve customers of Third World Press.