Book Review: How to be an Anti-Racist by Ibram X. Kendi
Ibram X. Kendi covers a lot of ground in How to be an Anti-Racist. I believe we all are his intended audience, no matter our race, color, sexual or gender identities, political affiliation, or any other segmentation you might consider. He makes it clear that this...Book Review: Chasing the Scream by Johann Hari
Johann Hari did so much more than enlighten me in his book Chasing the Scream: The First and Last Days of the War on Drugs. I met all the players in this war, from the government officials to the cartels and dealers, to those on the global leading edge of...Book Review: White Rage by Carol Anderson, Ph. D.
Carol Anderson, Ph.D tells a lot of hard truths in White Rage: The Unspoken Truth of Our Racial Divide. I believe her one hundred percent, partly because a solid half of this book is scholarly footnotes. And partly because of all the other social justice reading I’ve...Book Review: Ghost Boys by Jewell Parker Rhodes
Jewell Parker Rhodes mixes hard, cold reality with imagination in her middle-grade novel, Ghost Boys. It’s the story of a young African American boy, just 12 years old. And he dies by the gun of a police officer. So, going in I knew it wasn’t going to be an easy...Book Review: The Color of Law by Richard Rothstein
Richard Rothstein makes complex government-sanctioned segregation eminently clear in The Color of Law. Although he’s a researcher and academic, his writing is easy to read. It’s the content—the actions he describes—that made me angry enough to throw things. But I’m...Book Review: Walking with the Wind: A Memoir of the Movement by John Lewis
John Lewis creates an incredibly compelling historical memoir in Walking with the Wind. It’s one man’s experience, but it also chronicles the experience of a whole community. While it was written in 1996, so many parts ring true for today’s turbulent world. If you...Book Review: Behind the Beautiful Forevers by Katherine Boo
Katherine Boo won the 2012 Nonfiction National Book Award for Behind the Beautiful Forevers. Subtitled Life, Death, and Hope in a Mumbai Undercity, it is an intensely challenging book. Beautiful Forevers tells the story of a select group of slum dwellers. They live in...Book Review: When They Call You a Terrorist: A Black Lives Matter Memoir by Patrisse Khan-Cullors and asha bandele
When They Call You a Terrorist by Patrisse Khan-Cullors absolutely gutted me. I couldn’t breathe in so many parts of the book. I was holding my breath in sorrow, anger, outrage. With all this, you should know that I’m not a particularly emotional reader. I cry while...Book Review: Tears We Cannot Stop by Michael Eric Dyson
Michael Eric Dyson tells it like it is in Tears We Cannot Stop. Subtitled A Sermon for White America, it is just that. In both structure and tone, Dyson combines his experience as both pastor and professor. It is a moving and emotional book. But it’s also exquisitely...Book Review: American Yellow by George Omi
George (Minoru) Omi’s memoir about growing up second-generation (Nisei) Japanese in 1930s and 40s America is an important story. Everyone should hear more about the tragedy of incarcerating American citizens of Japanese descent after Pearl Harbor. My mother-in-law was...Racial and Social Justice Reading in 2017
During 2017 I’ve made a specific effort to broaden my reading experience, with emphasis on balancing my white, middle-class education and upbringing. I’ve tried to choose classics written by African Americans, historical works, as well as books that...Book Review: We Were Eight Years in Power: An American Tragedy by Ta-Nehisi Coates
To say Ta-Nehisi Coates covers a lot of ground in We Were Eight Years in Power is a true understatement. This book has done more to explain to me the state of the U.S. today than several of the other books I’ve read since the election combined. Coates reaches...Book Review: A Colony in a Nation by Chris Hayes
Chris Hayes believes that the United States has a Colony living in the borders of a Nation, which is another way of saying that some of us are treated markedly different than others. This is essentially a book about policing and imprisonment practices in the U.S. It...Book Review: The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander
Abolishing the Jim Crow laws was central to the successful change brought on by the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s. However, as the U.S. learned in the 2016 election cycle, we are far from a post-racial society. Long before that, back in 2010, Michelle Alexander...Book Review: Invisible Man, Got The Whole World Watching
I loved this book! It’s one young black man’s process of growing up and analyzing himself and the world he lives in. However, it’s not a traditional “coming of age” story with everyday minutiae. Smith includes his inspirations,...Currently reading
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