So this is the last book of the Joe Dillard series. I’m torn about it, because it covers two very important topics. It tackles race in the South, including false accusations against black men, the Klan, and racism by police. I feel like this topic is covered well, but I’m white, live in the North, and have never had to deal with racism directed at myself (due to being white). The other topic is sexual assault. Here’s where things get sticky. I know that every […]
A Short History of White Women’s Complicity
Mothers of Massive Resistance: White Women and the Politics of White Supremacy by Elizabeth Gillespie McRae
In Mothers of Massive Resistance: White Women and the Politics of White Supremacy, historian Elizabeth Gillespie McRae makes a strong argument for white women’s vital role in protecting and perpetuating white supremacy and thwarting integration in the US. One hundred years ago, woman began to organize in ways that we would recognize from today’s resistance movements. They developed grassroots campaigns reaching out to other women and encouraging them to organize, to write letters, to publish, to speak up and to vote. They did this, however, […]
“These are the frail, imperfect ways of ordinary human beings in the teeth of a great epidemic”
I finished reading this book a week ago today, and I’m still not sure how to write about it. I found it deeply moving, but it may still be too soon to put my thoughts and feelings into words, and anything I write here can only scratch the surface. Jonny Steinberg has packed so much into the 326 pages of Three-Letter Plague (published in the U.S. under the title Sizwe’s Test). He writes about his own literal and figurative journey to try to learn how […]
The Poor Have Always Been With Us
HALF CANNONBALL! I picked this audio book off the shelf at a library wine tasting because of it’s catchy Title. I mean, how can you see the glaring title, “White Trash,” and not be intrigued? And I haven’t listened to an audio book in a while, so it seemed like a good idea. And it was, mostly. White Trash chronologically unpacks the history of white poverty in America from the 1600s to 2012. Isenberg begins with the English penal colonies where the British government literally rounded […]
As beautiful as it is broken (wherein I get a little bit personal after a hiatus)
To say that this has been a difficult year would be an understatement. For Americans, no matter what one’s political affiliation is, it is clear to see that the rampant gas-lighting the current administration is putting us through is not normal. The word “fact” seems to have completely undergone a change in meaning, so much so that statements from politicians are view with the default setting of “definitely a lie.” Putting aside that I wake up every morning with a sense of impending dread that […]
“You can’t choose blindness when it suits you”
At 153 pages, one can get through The Ballad of Black Tom in an afternoon, but the issues that author Victor LaValle raises will stay with you long beyond that. This is a fantasy/horror novella set in 1924 New York City. The main characters are in touch with the mystical realm, but their interests in it will lead to horrors beyond imagination. There will be monsters, and some are of their own making. Though set in the ‘20s, LaValle’s story is a brilliant commentary on […]
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