As a white woman, my role in conversations about race is to listen and learn. This week, I wanted to include pieces about empowerment, stereotypes and intersection in the realm of race. One reading list cannot encompass the vast array of experiences of black Americans; this is not meant to be exhaustive. Send me your […]
race
Posted inQuotes
What Happened When We Discovered What Mattered
“Besides nearly killing me, college taught me several things. Namely, that external identity mattered. Being black mattered. It determined where to get off the Boston subway without receiving a baseball bat to the head. Being the biracial child of a single, white mother determined which whites would beg me, breezily to integrate certain spaces and […]
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Reading List: What's in an Ally?
Emily Perper is word-writing human for hire. She blogs about her favorite longreads at Diet Coker. In light of the recent Zimmerman trials, I’d like to share these four pieces. I’ve thought a lot about this blog post by Mary, who writes, “Another thing I’ve noticed is that people are more concerned with being the best ally than they […]
Posted inUncategorized
Reading List: What's in an Ally?
Emily Perper is word-writing human for hire. She blogs about her favorite longreads at Diet Coker. In light of the recent Zimmerman trials, I’d like to share these four pieces. I’ve thought a lot about this blog post by Mary, who writes, “Another thing I’ve noticed is that people are more concerned with being the best ally than they […]
Posted inUncategorized
In the first four years as the first black president, Obama has largely avoided addressing race directly. Some historical context: Thus the myth of ‘twice as good’ that makes Barack Obama possible also smothers him. It holds that African Americans—enslaved, tortured, raped, discriminated against, and subjected to the most lethal homegrown terrorist movement in American […]
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A memoir of “growing up black, on parole, in Mississippi”: I enroll at Jackson State University in the Spring semester, where my mother teaches Political Science. Even though, I’m not really living at home, everyday Mama and I fight over my job at Cutco and her staying with her boyfriend and her not letting me […]
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“I’ve been teaching high school social studies for 18 years, so it’s hard for me to be shocked by the behavior of students. But every once in a while, someone manages to surprise me. One day last year I looked up at the auditorium stage to hear one of my students deliver a speech that […]