Readings on Racial Justice: Books

“Two years after Obama’s election, Alexander put the entire criminal justice system on trial, exposing racial discrimination from lawmaking to policing to the denial of voting rights to ex-prisoners. This bestseller struck the spark that would eventually light the fire of Black Lives matter.” —Ibram X. Kendi, The New York Times

"Elizabeth Hinton traces the rise of mass incarceration to an ironic source: the social welfare programs of Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society at the height of the civil rights era." —Harvard University Press.

"Coates delivers a fiery soliloquy dissecting the tradition of the erasure of African-Americans beginning with the deeply personal.”—Minneapolis Star Tribune

"Minor Feelings doesn't read like an answer to, or even a declarative thesis on, Asian America. Instead, it reads like a probing new beginning. Propelled by minor feelings, itching and dissatisfied, this is a reckoning that has only just begun." – Jisu Kim, Women’s Review of Books

"In her probing and personal narrative, Eddo-Lodge offers fresh insight into the way all racism is ultimately a 'white problem' that must be addressed by commitment to action, no matter how small." —Kirkus Reviews

The Fire This Time "seeks to place the shock of our own times into historical context and, most importantly, to move these times forward."—Vogue

"Chang explores the rise and fall of the idea of "diversity," the roots of student protest, changing ideas about Asian Americanness, and the impact of a century of racial separation in housing." -- Picador

Ijeoma Oluo guides readers of all races through subjects ranging from intersectionality and affirmative action to "model minorities" in an attempt to make the seemingly impossible possible: honest conversations about race and racism, and how they infect almost every aspect of American life. -- Hachette

"The Racial Healing Handbook offers practical tools to help you navigate daily and past experiences of racism, challenge internalized negative messages and privileges, and handle feelings of stress and shame. You’ll also learn to develop a profound racial consciousness and conscientiousness, and heal from grief and trauma. Most importantly, you’ll discover the building blocks to creating a community of healing in a world still filled with racial microaggressions and discrimination." —New Harbinger Publications

"Fatal Invention offers remarkable insight into how persistent claims of racial difference as biological difference retain residual notions of racial hierarchy as poisonous today as at any time before." -- Osagie K Obasogie, New Scientist

“A bracing, highly useful tool for any discussion of combating racism.” —Kirkus Reviews

"Redefining Realness overflows with the everyday magic of survival and resiliency in low income communities of color, of loving kindness bursting through the cracks of a hard reality, and of the life-sustaining bonds of family, friendships, and a powerful trans sisterhood.” —Susan Stryker

“Kiese… chronicles the profound challenges of living in a black body. This is an important book.” –Bookish

Film based on James Baldwin's unfinished book Remember this House.

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