Blindspot: Hidden Biases of Good People
Bantam, 2016
Banaji, Mahzarin R.
“Leading psychologists Mahzarin R. Banaji and Anthony G. Greenwald explore the hidden biases we all carry from a lifetime of exposure to cultural attitudes about age, gender, race, ethnicity, religion, social class, sexuality, disability status, and nationality. Banaji and Greenwald question the extent to which our perceptions of social groups—without our awareness or conscious control—shape our likes and dislikes and our judgments about people’s character, abilities, and potential. In Blindspot, the authors reveal hidden biases based on their experience with the Implicit Association Test, a method that has revolutionized the way scientists learn about the human mind and that gives us a glimpse into what lies within the metaphoric blindspot.”
Colorblind Racism
Polity, 2018
Burke, Meghan
“How can colorblindness - the idea that race does not matter - be racist? This illuminating book introduces the paradox of colorblind racism: how dismissing or downplaying the realities of race and racism can perpetuate inequality and violence.”
White Guys on Campus: Racism, White Immunity, and the Myth of “Post-Racial” Higher Education
Rutgers University Press, 2018
Cabrera, Nolan L.
“This book details many of the contours of contemporary, systemic racism, while engaging the possibility of White students to participate in anti-racism. Ultimately, White Guys on Campus calls upon institutions of higher education to be sites of social transformation instead of reinforcing systemic racism, while creating a platform to engage and challenge the public discourse of “post- racialism.”
White Fragility: Why It’s So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism
Beacon Press, 2018
DiAngelo, Robin
“Referring to the defensive moves that white people make when challenged racially, white fragility is characterized by emotions such as anger, fear, and guilt, and by behaviors including argumentation and silence. These behaviors, in turn, function to reinstate white racial equilibrium and prevent any meaningful cross-racial dialogue. In this in-depth exploration, DiAngelo examines how white fragility develops, how it protects racial inequality, and what we can do to engage more constructively.”
Myths America Lives By: White Supremacy and the Stories that Give Us Meaning
University of Illinois Press, 2018
Hughes, Richard T.
“Six myths lie at the heart of the American experience. Taken as aspirational, four of those myths remind us of our noblest ideals, challenging us to realize our nation's promise while galvanizing the sense of hope and unity we need to reach our goals. Misused, these myths allow for illusions of innocence that fly in the face of white supremacy, the primal American myth that stands at the heart of all the others.”
When Affirmative Action was White: An Untold History of Racial Inequality in Twentieth-Century America
W.W. Norton, 2006
Katznelson, Ira
“Ira Katznelson fundamentally recasts our understanding of twentieth-century American history and demonstrates that all the key programs passed during the New Deal and Fair Deal era of the 1930s and 1940s were created in a deeply discriminatory manner. Through mechanisms designed by Southern Democrats that specifically excluded maids and farm workers, the gap between blacks and whites actually widened despite postwar prosperity.”
How to Be an Anti-Racist
One World, 2019
Kendi, Ibram X.
“Ibram X. Kendi's concept of antiracism reenergizes and reshapes the conversation about racial justice in America--but even more fundamentally, points us toward liberating new ways of thinking about ourselves and each other. Instead of working with the policies and system we have in place, Kendi asks us to think about what an antiracist society might look like, and how we can play an active role in building it.”
Beyond the Whiteness of Whiteness: Memoir of a White Mother of Black Sons
Duke University Press, 1996
Lazare, Jane
“Beyond the Whiteness of Whiteness is Jane Lazarre’s memoir of coming to terms with this painful truth, of learning to look into the nature of whiteness in a way that passionately informs the connections between herself and her family. A moving account of life in a biracial family, this book is a powerful meditation on motherhood and racism in America, the story of an education into the realities of African American culture.”
Dying of Whiteness: How the Politics of Racial Resentment Is Killing America’s Heartland
Basic Books, 2019
Metzl, Jonathan M.
“Physician Jonathan M. Metzl's quest to understand the health implications of "backlash governance" leads him across America's heartland. Interviewing a range of everyday Americans, he examines how racial resentment has fueled progun laws in Missouri, resistance to the Affordable Care Act in Tennessee, and cuts to schools and social services in Kansas. And he shows these policies' costs: increasing deaths by gun suicide, falling life expectancies, and rising dropout rates. White Americans, Metzl argues, must reject the racial hierarchies that promise to aid them but in fact lead our nation to demise.”
Algorithms of Oppression: How Search Engines Reinforce Racism
NYU Press, 2018
Noble, Safiya Umoja
“In Algorithms of Oppression, Safiya Umoja Noble challenges the idea that search engines like Google offer an equal playing field for all forms of ideas, identities, and activities. Data discrimination is a real social problem; Noble argues that the combination of private interests in promoting certain sites, along with the monopoly status of a relatively small number of Internet search engines, leads to a biased set of search algorithms that privilege whiteness and discriminate against people of color, specifically women of color.”
But I’m Not Racist!: Tools For Well Meaning Whites
Difference Press, 2018
Obear, Kathy
“For the past two decades as a speaker and an executive coach, Dr. Kathy Obear has helped thousands of whites find the courage to challenge and change the dynamics of racism in their organizations. Read this book and find the inspiration and tools to deepen your resolve to live your values every day as a change agent for racial justice.”
So, You Want to Talk About Race
Seal Press, 2019
Oluo, Ijeoma
“In So You Want to Talk About Race, 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.”
Fatal Invention: How Science, Politics, and Big Business Recreate Race in the Twenty-First Century
The New Press, 2012
Roberts, Dorothy
“This groundbreaking book by legal scholar and social critic Dorothy Roberts examines how the myth of race as a biological concept—revived by purportedly cutting-edge science, race-specific drugs, genetic testing, and DNA databases—continues to undermine a just society and promote inequality in a supposedly “post-racial” era.”
Invisible Privilege: A Memoir About Race, Class, and Gender
University Press of Kansas, 2000
Rothenberg, Paula S.
“Life began for Paula Rothenberg in a privileged home in New York City, but it took her to the battlefields of the culture wars on behalf of the underprivileged. Now this veteran of that cultural clash examines the subtle and complex ways in which issues of race, class, and gender impact people's lives. Both deeply personal and broadly social, this finely crafted memoir will capture the interest of anyone who cares about the future of education, race relations, feminism, and social justice.”
The Color of Law: A Forgotten History of How Our Government Segregated America
Liveright, 2018
Rothstein, Richard.
“Exploding the myth of de facto segregation arising from private prejudice or the unintended consequences of economic forces, Rothstein describes how the American government systematically imposed residential segregation: with undisguised racial zoning; public housing that purposefully segregated previously mixed communities; subsidies for builders to create whites-only suburbs; tax exemptions for institutions that enforced segregation; and support for violent resistance to African Americans in white neighborhoods.”
Me and White Supremacy: Combat Racism, Change the World, and Become a Good Ancestor
Sourcebooks, 2020
Saad, Layla F.
“Based on the viral Instagram challenge that captivated participants worldwide, Me and White Supremacy takes readers on a 28-day journey of how to dismantle the privilege within themselves so that they can stop (often unconsciously) inflicting damage on people of color, and in turn, help other white people do better, too.”
Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?
Revised edition, Basic Books, 2017
Tatum, Beverly Daniel
“Walk into any racially mixed high school and you will see Black, White, and Latino youth clustered in their own groups. Is this self-segregation a problem to address or a coping strategy? Beverly Daniel Tatum, a renowned authority on the psychology of racism, argues that straight talk about our racial identities is essential if we are serious about enabling communication across racial and ethnic divides.”
Colorblind: The Rise of Post-Racial Politics and the Retreat from Racial Equity
City Lights Open Media, 2010
Wise, Tim
“Focusing on disparities in employment, housing, education and healthcare, Wise argues that racism is indeed still an acute problem in the United States today, and that colorblind policies actually worsen the problem of racial injustice. Colorblind presents a timely and provocative look at contemporary racism and offers fresh ideas on what can be done to achieve true social justice and economic equality.”
*Descriptions pulled from amazon.com, Google Reads, written by fellow authors, publishers, and/or their respective marketing companies.