Black and British: We’re Not American
A Review of This is Not America. Why Black Lives in Britain Matter by Tomiwa Owolade (Atlantic, 2023). In the popular perception, America is obsessed with race, while Britain is…
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Race
67 posts
Hood-Adjacent: Place and Class in Black American Life
It would be wonderful to live in a world without labels or stereotypes. But it is impossible to analyse complex widescale social trends without thinking in terms of broad categories…
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It’s Class, Not Race
It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so. — Mark Twain In 2018, Raj Chetty and his…
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Demystifying Critical Race Theory
Critical Race Theory (CRT) originated in higher education, but its political relevance has become more than academic, especially in the United States. Although CRT sprung from legal scholarship, proponents have…
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Transcending Race
A Review of Kenan Malik’s Not So Black and White: A History of Race from White Supremacy to Identity Politics (Hurst Publishers, 2023) Race remains one of society’s great delusions. It is modern civilisation’s most enduring superstition.…
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The New Normal
My father was born in 1953 in Utah to a fairly conservative, white Mormon family. In 1954, Brown v. Board of Education began the long process of desegregating schools in…
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Who’s Black and Why? An Interview with Andrew Curran
In this episode of our Two for Tea podcast, editor-in-chief Iona Italia talks to Andrew Curran about his new anthology, prepared in collaboration with Henry Louis Gates, Who’s Black and Why: A…
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The 1619 Project: An Oversimplified Explanation
Casual critics of the 1619 Project usually focus on its basic conceit: the idea that the true founding of the United States occurred when the first African captives arrived in…
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White People and the Conversation About Race
It is always saddening when reasonable, thoughtful people fail to understand each other’s point of view in important conversations. It is even more unfortunate when they fail to respect each…
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The Enduring Importance of Eric Williams’ “Capitalism and Slavery”
As a new generation grapples with the effects of racism and capitalism, it is no surprise that Penguin Modern Classics has been publishing new editions of classic texts authored by…
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In Defence of Immigrants: A Reply to Lionel Shriver
In 2009, Lionel Shriver, the American author of the award-winning novel We Need to Talk About Kevin, and columnist at the Spectator, shared a deeply felt wish. As an immigrant…
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“The Great American Race Game.” Film Review
In its struggle against left-liberalism, one of the conundrums faced by the Anglo-American right in all its hues is how to shake off its longstanding image as a shady coterie…
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Transcending Racial Divisions: Will You Stand by Me?, by Christine Louis Dit-Sully
Can humanity transcend racial divisions? It might seem like a quixotic venture, given how pervasive race-related thinking still is in society. Not a day goes by without a race-related controversy…
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Masochistic Nationalism by Göran Adamson. Review.
The Swedish sociologist Göran Adamson’s latest book, Masochistic Nationalism: Multicultural Self-Hatred and the Infatuation with the Exotic (2021), identifies two forms of nationalism in contemporary society (white supremacist and anti-white)…
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America Is Not a White Supremacist Nation
It has become fashionable in some left-wing circles to regard the US as a white supremacist state. Until about 2017, white supremacists were people who burned crosses on church lawns…
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What Ibram X. Kendi Gets Wrong About Reparations
Prominent scholar and activist Dr. Ibram X. Kendi has claimed, “To oppose reparations is to be racist. To support reparations is to be anti-racist.” But is Kendi right? One way…
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We Need a New Model of Diversity
There is no doubt that US society is deeply divided along racial, ethnic and religious lines. While schools, corporations and other institutions continue to embrace much needed diversity programmes, many…
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Systemic Racism and Policing in America: A Response to Brandon Vaidyanathan
When we talk about race in America today, we think we are debating facts, but we are actually debating stories. We think the debate is over whether racism is evil,…
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