Ratings4
Average rating4.5
Very brave to write a book like this which takes on the dominant historical narrative and shoots arrows at it made of logic and historical fact. As usual, I think this book was too long. And the tone was too scholarly. But the main point came through very powerfully: the way the white liberal portrays the black redneck is historically inaccurate. Eg the false assumption that African Americans' advancement has been primarily hamstrung by the outfall of the uniquely cruel history of cotton enslavement. This portrayal also does not serve the best interests for advancement, especially this narrative that the whole system of racial privilege needs to be gone before black individuals can succeed, undersells the ability to advance in the face of the headwinds, which has been demonstrated many times already.