I guess I have a different take on media because I have middle-class values (the good and the bad) but I didn't grow up middle class or in a middle class neighborhood. Anything I have is because my Mom and family went through the struggle so I like seeing the struggle represented because it is true for me and mine.
Apart from that, I don't consider myself African-American but Carribean American and I have yet to see that represented on tv and only rarely in a magazine. It's not something that gets considered in the general "black experience" unless you live in NY or FL which has always struck me as an unfair fact of life. Even PBS (whish I agree is the best place to see shows about Af-Am culture- LOVED the Ken Burns Jazz series) has yet to explore that. There are so MANY facets of the African diasporic culture that tv and media can not begin to show them all.
Anyway, my picks-
books:
Brown Girl, Brownstones by Paule Marshall (I loved loved loved this book)
ANYTHING by Edwige Dandicat
Wild Seed by Octavia Butler
Race by Studs Terkel
The Lonely Londoners by Sam Selvon
Brown Girl In The Ring by Nalo Hopkinson
Down These Mean Streets by Piri Thomas (I can not say how much I loved this one too)
And really, I don't watch a lot of tv other than HBO and reality tv anymore
so I can't say much for that medium except that I don't really like any of the "black" shows on there. Law and Order doesn't count as a black show does it?
Music:
Buju Banton
The Roots
Floetry
but then I am a broke downloader so I don't know that my picks can really count.