Hawa Allan is a lawyer and writer of cultural criticism, fiction and poetry. Her work has been published in the Baffler, Lapham's Quarterly, Boston Globe, and Time Magazine, among other places. Her debut book Insurrection: Rebellion, Civil Rights, and the Paradoxical State of Black Citizenship interweaves legal history and personal narrative. "Eloquently mixing history, autobiography, and philosophy," writes Publishers Weekly of Insurrection, "this powerful account sheds new light on the Black experience in America."