An inclusive, edifying, often fiery assembly of voices articulating the way forward for Black America—and America in general.
An expansive set of essays highlighting the range and force of Black leadership.
Opoku-Agyeman puts the point bluntly in her introduction: “Black experts matter now more than ever because they are not just critical to providing us with the tools and language to decipher a world bent on undermining Black life—they are also equipped to provide the backdrop of lived experience that further contextualizes their expertise. Experience is the difference between studying racial inequality and living through it.” Each contributor demonstrates the value of such perspectives on an impressively broad set of subjects: climate, health care, wellness, education, technology, criminal justice, the economy, and public policy. Such breadth exposes racist ideologies and practices in diverse areas of contemporary life while also drawing attention to their complex interrelations. As the essays make clear, understanding Black experiences and furthering anti-racist activism means accounting for the sequelae of any "isolated" phenomenon: Fair and effective responses to climate change, for instance, must involve consideration of systemic biases in such areas as housing, policing, and commerce. The contributors repeatedly underscore the urgency of such intersectional approaches during the pandemic, given its disproportionate impact on Black communities. Among the most instructive and stimulating essays in this collection are those that target rapidly evolving forms of racial discrimination, as in Deborah Raji’s examination of the embedded biases and blind spots of Amazon’s facial recognition technology. A particular strength of many of the essays, moreover, is their precision in identifying forms of resistance that have proven successful in the past and in speculating on those that hold special promise for the future. Cliff Albright’s exploration of voter suppression stands out in this regard. “Sustained direct action, including civil disobedience” will be necessary, he affirms, for the protection of voting rights. Tressie McMillan Cottom provides the foreword, and the recommended reading lists a trove of worthy books to further education.
An inclusive, edifying, often fiery assembly of voices articulating the way forward for Black America—and America in general.Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-250-27687-2
Page Count: 288
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Nov. 12, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2021
For Howard Zinn, long-time civil rights and anti-war activist, history and ideology have a lot in common. Since he thinks that everything is in someone's interest, the historian—Zinn posits—has to figure out whose interests he or she is defining/defending/reconstructing (hence one of his previous books, The Politics of History). Zinn has no doubts about where he stands in this "people's history": "it is a history disrespectful of governments and respectful of people's movements of resistance." So what we get here, instead of the usual survey of wars, presidents, and institutions, is a survey of the usual rebellions, strikes, and protest movements. Zinn starts out by depicting the arrival of Columbus in North America from the standpoint of the Indians (which amounts to their standpoint as constructed from the observations of the Europeans); and, after easily establishing the cultural disharmony that ensued, he goes on to the importation of slaves into the colonies. Add the laborers and indentured servants that followed, plus women and later immigrants, and you have Zinn's amorphous constituency. To hear Zinn tell it, all anyone did in America at any time was to oppress or be oppressed; and so he obscures as much as his hated mainstream historical foes do—only in Zinn's case there is that absurd presumption that virtually everything that came to pass was the work of ruling-class planning: this amounts to one great indictment for conspiracy. Despite surface similarities, this is not a social history, since we get no sense of the fabric of life. Instead of negating the one-sided histories he detests, Zinn has merely reversed the image; the distortion remains.
Pub Date: Jan. 1, 1979
ISBN: 0061965588
Page Count: 772
Publisher: Harper & Row
Review Posted Online: May 26, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 1979
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A fierce, penetrating, and empowering call for change.
Artist and activist Vaid-Menon demonstrates how the normativity of the gender binary represses creativity and inflicts physical and emotional violence.
The author, whose parents emigrated from India, writes about how enforcement of the gender binary begins before birth and affects people in all stages of life, with people of color being especially vulnerable due to Western conceptions of gender as binary. Gender assignments create a narrative for how a person should behave, what they are allowed to like or wear, and how they express themself. Punishment of nonconformity leads to an inseparable link between gender and shame. Vaid-Menon challenges familiar arguments against gender nonconformity, breaking them down into four categories—dismissal, inconvenience, biology, and the slippery slope (fear of the consequences of acceptance). Headers in bold font create an accessible navigation experience from one analysis to the next. The prose maintains a conversational tone that feels as intimate and vulnerable as talking with a best friend. At the same time, the author's turns of phrase in moments of deep insight ring with precision and poetry. In one reflection, they write, “the most lethal part of the human body is not the fist; it is the eye. What people see and how people see it has everything to do with power.” While this short essay speaks honestly of pain and injustice, it concludes with encouragement and an invitation into a future that celebrates transformation.
A fierce, penetrating, and empowering call for change. (writing prompt) (Nonfiction. 14-adult)Pub Date: June 2, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-593-09465-5
Page Count: 64
Publisher: Penguin Workshop
Review Posted Online: March 14, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2020
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