Selects: How the Negro Leagues Worked

Widely acclaimed upon its publication in 2017, The Color of Law demonstrates that racial residential segregation—the fact that some neighborhoods are almost exclusively African American while others are almost exclusively white—is the result of explicit government policy rather than personal choice and random chance. From the conclusion of the Civil War through to the present day, federal, state, and local governments have enacted laws to confine African Americans to particular areas and prevent them from moving into others. These policies have had a profound and lasting impact on African Americans, affecting their educational and job opportunities, economic well-being, and physical health.

In this New York Times bestseller, Michelle Alexander argues that the war on drugs has created a new racial caste system, disproportionately punishing black people. A powerfully interlocking system of laws and policies targets black people for drug crime, punishes them more severely than white criminals, and makes life as an ex-felon extremely difficult. The result is effectively racial subjugation and disenfranchisement.

In this summary, you’ll learn how the war on drugs followed a pattern of implementation consistent with slavery and Jim Crow, how financial incentives and legal protection allow selective targeting of black males for drug crimes, and why it’s so difficult for drug convicts to reintegrate into society.

It started as an internet meme: “God give me the confidence of a mediocre white dude.” But in her 2020 book Mediocre, Ijeoma Oluo takes the joke seriously, asking why many white men in US society attain powerful positions despite unimpressive qualifications and results. She also contends that this pattern of privilege hurts everyone including the white men it supposedly favors. By tracing this pattern’s historical roots in white supremacy and some of its present manifestations—most notably the numerous racial controversies in American football—Oluo seeks to explain what she sees as the failings of this system and to inspire readers to fight for a more equitable society.

Our commentary will provide additional details and perspectives on white supremacy. We’ll also examine the efforts some organizations and governments have made to address the imbalance of power in society and the mixed results those efforts have had.

Conventional accounts of American history tend to focus on the people at the top—presidents, generals, CEOs, and other influential figures and their struggles, ambitions, hopes, and dreams. But what about average people? The ones who had to live with the consequences of elite decisions, and who often struggled in obscurity? In A People’s History of the United States, historian Howard Zinn aims to tell their story, providing a bottom-up view of American history focusing on Indigenous people, Black Americans, women, laborers, and activists.

Our guide outlines Zinn’s interpretation of significant events, themes, and historical trends in American history. Through our commentary, we’ll provide alternative opinions on the motivations behind and consequences of historical events. We’ll also further explain Zinn’s approach to history and provide additional context for his arguments as well as his perspective on events that happened after the book’s publication.

In Caste, Isabel Wilkerson argues that the racial tensions in the United States are better explained through the lens of caste, not race—a 400-year-old hierarchy placing white people at the top and Black people at the bottom. Wilkerson examines the different caste systems around the world and how they damage the lives of everyone involved, even those at the top. She believes that to understand how to move forward, we must examine the past and the racial structures that keep progress as a nation at bay.

In this guide, we’ll explore the basics of Wilkerson’s caste theory, the eight tenets of a caste system, how the caste system affects the lives of people in the upper and lower castes, and how we can move away from caste and create a more equitable society. We’ll also compare Wilkerson’s ideas to those of other books on the subject of race, such as Michelle Alexander’s The New Jim Crow.

Widely acclaimed upon its publication in 2017, The Color of Law demonstrates that racial residential segregation—the fact that some neighborhoods are almost exclusively African American while others are almost exclusively white—is the result of explicit government policy rather than personal choice and random chance. From the conclusion of the Civil War through to the present day, federal, state, and local governments have enacted laws to confine African Americans to particular areas and prevent them from moving into others. These policies have had a profound and lasting impact on African Americans, affecting their educational and job opportunities, economic well-being, and physical health.

More than 50 years after the Civil Rights Movement and more than 14 years after electing its first Black president, why is the United States still divided along racial lines? That’s the central question of Ibram X. Kendi’s Stamped from the Beginning, which argues that contrary to common wisdom, racism doesn’t begin with prejudice and hatred—it begins with self-serving policies whose proponents justify their actions by inventing racist ideas. Kendi, an African American Studies scholar, develops this claim by analyzing the history of racist ideas in the United States and offering readers a better understanding of how to combat contemporary racism.

In this guide, we’ll explore such insights as how enslavers convinced themselves that slavery benefited slaves and why most antiracist reformers harbored racist thoughts. Along the way, we’ll make connections between this book and Kendi’s later writings, and we’ll expand upon, and sometimes challenge, Kendi’s ideas by referring to other prominent writers on race such as Robin DiAngelo and Jennifer Eberhardt.

It started as an internet meme: “God give me the confidence of a mediocre white dude.” But in her 2020 book Mediocre, Ijeoma Oluo takes the joke seriously, asking why many white men in US society attain powerful positions despite unimpressive qualifications and results. She also contends that this pattern of privilege hurts everyone including the white men it supposedly favors. By tracing this pattern’s historical roots in white supremacy and some of its present manifestations—most notably the numerous racial controversies in American football—Oluo seeks to explain what she sees as the failings of this system and to inspire readers to fight for a more equitable society.

Our commentary will provide additional details and perspectives on white supremacy. We’ll also examine the efforts some organizations and governments have made to address the imbalance of power in society and the mixed results those efforts have had.