Narrative Matters is intended to be a call to action that realigns Blacks’ socioeconomic consciousness with their socioeconomic reality. Paradoxical Ebullience is a contradiction in the purported ebullient view that Blacks hold regarding their economic position relative to the reality of their economic progress. Driven by post-racial neoliberal narratives that allege socioeconomic outcomes and life chances are no longer tied to race, America’s ascendant narrative tells Blacks to abandon collective action in favor of individualism to improve their economic position. Alternatively, Critical Race Theory’s tenant of counter-storytelling says that narratives from the perspective of marginalized groups matter and that subalterns need to tell their own story to counteract the false narratives for why they experience economic stagnation. Lessie Branch is a Senior Research Fellow at the DuBois Bunche Center for Public Policy at Medgar Evers College. She is also on faculty at Monroe College. Dr. Branch has a Ph.D. and an M. Phil from Milano School of International Affairs, Management, and Urban Policy as well as an MA in Political Science from the New School of Social Research. She completed her BA in Political Science at Fordham University. Her research examines the gulf between African American optimism about group progress and the actual data on continuing disparities and potentially speaks to wider questions of social knowledge, social beliefs and relative group position; even to questions of "consciousness" and ontology. Dr. Branch’s most recent project, Paradoxical Ebullience: Discordance Between Changing Black Racial Attitudes and Stagnation of Black Economic Progress is being considered for the Cambridge University Press series on Stratification Economics. This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at http://ted.com/tedx