While the historic election of President Barack Obama ushered in an era of change in geopolitics, it also generated a seismic shift in the talk about racial politics at home and abroad.

What Obama's election did not signify, though, was the arrival of a 'post-racial' America, according to author and journalist Ytasha L. Womack. Instead, it resulted in what she calls "post-black America.''

In her new book, 'Post Black: How a New Generation is Redefining African American Identity,' Womack explores the concept via socioeconomic and cultural trends, using diversity as the mechanism for change. She unpacks the ideas through the voices of young professionals, gays and lesbians, and African and Caribbean immigrants, who represent an emerging and complex African American community.

"The new diversity in African American life doesn't neatly fit into America's image box,'' she writes. "It doesn't neatly fit into black America's box either. If I swore that African immigrants were the nation's highest-educated newcomers, that a black man was building a multibillion-dollar hotel in Vegas, or that young black professionals even existed, there are people, smart people, who would look at me with blank stares. If I told them they could launch a protest via Twitter, they would faint.''

Womack gives voice to an important conversation that is sure to be around for years to come. Besides 'Post Black,' she co-edited the anthology 'Beats Rhymes and Life: What We Love and Hate About Hip-Hop,' A resident of Chicago, she also has written for Vibe, Essence, Ebony, XXL and the Chicago Tribune.