Think about it this way—if you came up to a random person and said "Donald Knuth is one of the most revered computer scientists in human history" and they said "well why haven't I heard of them before", would that mean Donald Knuth is a nobody, or that this person just doesn't really have any interest or background in this person's field?
I almost exclusively read fiction. I do not read a lot of (any) period African-American literature given I read for pleasure and not for tales of historically accurate racism and child molestation (The Bluest Eye apparently) in fiction (which appears to be her thing based on the 5 wiki entries I opened for her works).
Guess you answered your own question, a hole in your reading preferences is a reflection of you, not society. For the record I read The Bluest Eye in college and it was pretty eye-opening.