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How to Be an Antiracist
- Narrated by: Ibram X. Kendi
- Length: 10 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged Audiobook
- Categories: Politics & Social Sciences, Politics & Government
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White Fragility
- Why It's So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism
- Written by: Dr. Robin DiAngelo, Michael Eric Dyson - foreword
- Narrated by: Amy Landon
- Length: 6 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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In this “vital, necessary, and beautiful book” (Michael Eric Dyson), antiracist educator Robin DiAngelo deftly illuminates the phenomenon of white fragility and “allows us to understand racism as a practice not restricted to 'bad people'" (Claudia Rankine). Referring to the defensive moves 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 meaningful cross-racial dialogue.
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White guilt
- By j on 2020-06-26
Written by: Dr. Robin DiAngelo, and others
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The Skin We're In
- A Year of Black Resistance and Power
- Written by: Desmond Cole
- Narrated by: Desmond Cole
- Length: 8 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
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Puncturing the bubble of Canadian smugness and naive assumptions of a post-racial nation, Cole chronicles just one year - 2017 - in the struggle against racism in this country. It was a year that saw calls for tighter borders when black refugees braved frigid temperatures to cross into Manitoba from the States, Indigenous land and water protectors resisting the celebration of Canada’s 150th birthday, police across the country rallying around an officer accused of murder, and more.
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A must read!
- By denise on 2020-02-27
Written by: Desmond Cole
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Me and White Supremacy
- Combat Racism, Change the World, and Become a Good Ancestor
- Written by: Layla F. Saad
- Narrated by: Layla F. Saad
- Length: 5 hrs and 19 mins
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When Layla Saad began an Instagram challenge called #meandwhitesupremacy, she never predicted it would spread as widely as it did. She encouraged people to own up and share their racist behaviors, big and small. She was looking for truth, and she got it. Thousands of people participated in the challenge, and over 90,000 people downloaded the Me and White Supremacy Workbook.
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Mixed Emotions
- By Bennymac on 2020-06-14
Written by: Layla F. Saad
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21 Things You May Not Know About the Indian Act
- Helping Canadians Make Reconciliation with Indigenous Peoples a Reality
- Written by: Bob Joseph
- Narrated by: Sage Isaac
- Length: 3 hrs and 38 mins
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Based on a viral article, 21 Things You May Not Know About the Indian Act is the essential guide to understanding the legal document and its repercussion on generations of Indigenous peoples, written by a leading cultural sensitivity trainer. The Indian Act, after 141 years, continues to shape, control, and constrain the lives and opportunities of Indigenous peoples, and is at the root of many lasting stereotypes.
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Essentially Canadian - Must Read.
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Written by: Bob Joseph
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So You Want to Talk About Race
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- Narrated by: Bahni Turpin
- Length: 7 hrs and 41 mins
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In So You Want to Talk About Race, Ijeoma Oluo offers a contemporary, accessible take on the racial landscape in America, addressing head-on such issues as privilege, police brutality, intersectionality, micro-aggressions, the Black Lives Matter movement, and the "N" word. Perfectly positioned to bridge the gap between people of color and white Americans struggling with race complexities, Oluo answers the questions listeners don't dare ask and explains the concepts that continue to elude everyday Americans.
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Interesting listen
- By Anonymous User on 2020-06-14
Written by: Ijeoma Oluo
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How to Raise an Antiracist
- Written by: Ibram X. Kendi
- Narrated by: Ibram X. Kendi
- Length: 6 hrs and 46 mins
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Overall
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Performance
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The tragedies and reckonings around racism that are rocking the country have created a specific crisis for parents, educators, and other caregivers: How do we talk to our children about racism? How do we teach children to be antiracist? How are kids at different ages experiencing race? How are racist structures impacting children? How can we inspire our children to avoid our mistakes, to be better, to make the world better? These are the questions Ibram X. Kendi found himself avoiding as he anticipated the birth of his first child.
Written by: Ibram X. Kendi
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White Fragility
- Why It's So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism
- Written by: Dr. Robin DiAngelo, Michael Eric Dyson - foreword
- Narrated by: Amy Landon
- Length: 6 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this “vital, necessary, and beautiful book” (Michael Eric Dyson), antiracist educator Robin DiAngelo deftly illuminates the phenomenon of white fragility and “allows us to understand racism as a practice not restricted to 'bad people'" (Claudia Rankine). Referring to the defensive moves 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 meaningful cross-racial dialogue.
-
-
White guilt
- By j on 2020-06-26
Written by: Dr. Robin DiAngelo, and others
-
The Skin We're In
- A Year of Black Resistance and Power
- Written by: Desmond Cole
- Narrated by: Desmond Cole
- Length: 8 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Puncturing the bubble of Canadian smugness and naive assumptions of a post-racial nation, Cole chronicles just one year - 2017 - in the struggle against racism in this country. It was a year that saw calls for tighter borders when black refugees braved frigid temperatures to cross into Manitoba from the States, Indigenous land and water protectors resisting the celebration of Canada’s 150th birthday, police across the country rallying around an officer accused of murder, and more.
-
-
A must read!
- By denise on 2020-02-27
Written by: Desmond Cole
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Me and White Supremacy
- Combat Racism, Change the World, and Become a Good Ancestor
- Written by: Layla F. Saad
- Narrated by: Layla F. Saad
- Length: 5 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When Layla Saad began an Instagram challenge called #meandwhitesupremacy, she never predicted it would spread as widely as it did. She encouraged people to own up and share their racist behaviors, big and small. She was looking for truth, and she got it. Thousands of people participated in the challenge, and over 90,000 people downloaded the Me and White Supremacy Workbook.
-
-
Mixed Emotions
- By Bennymac on 2020-06-14
Written by: Layla F. Saad
-
21 Things You May Not Know About the Indian Act
- Helping Canadians Make Reconciliation with Indigenous Peoples a Reality
- Written by: Bob Joseph
- Narrated by: Sage Isaac
- Length: 3 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Based on a viral article, 21 Things You May Not Know About the Indian Act is the essential guide to understanding the legal document and its repercussion on generations of Indigenous peoples, written by a leading cultural sensitivity trainer. The Indian Act, after 141 years, continues to shape, control, and constrain the lives and opportunities of Indigenous peoples, and is at the root of many lasting stereotypes.
-
-
Essentially Canadian - Must Read.
- By Marcel Molin on 2019-08-23
Written by: Bob Joseph
-
So You Want to Talk About Race
- Written by: Ijeoma Oluo
- Narrated by: Bahni Turpin
- Length: 7 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In So You Want to Talk About Race, Ijeoma Oluo offers a contemporary, accessible take on the racial landscape in America, addressing head-on such issues as privilege, police brutality, intersectionality, micro-aggressions, the Black Lives Matter movement, and the "N" word. Perfectly positioned to bridge the gap between people of color and white Americans struggling with race complexities, Oluo answers the questions listeners don't dare ask and explains the concepts that continue to elude everyday Americans.
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-
Interesting listen
- By Anonymous User on 2020-06-14
Written by: Ijeoma Oluo
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How to Raise an Antiracist
- Written by: Ibram X. Kendi
- Narrated by: Ibram X. Kendi
- Length: 6 hrs and 46 mins
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Overall
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Performance
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The tragedies and reckonings around racism that are rocking the country have created a specific crisis for parents, educators, and other caregivers: How do we talk to our children about racism? How do we teach children to be antiracist? How are kids at different ages experiencing race? How are racist structures impacting children? How can we inspire our children to avoid our mistakes, to be better, to make the world better? These are the questions Ibram X. Kendi found himself avoiding as he anticipated the birth of his first child.
Written by: Ibram X. Kendi
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Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?
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The classic, New York Times best-selling book on the psychology of racism that shows us how to talk about race in America. 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? How can we get past our reluctance to discuss racial issues? This fully revised edition is essential listening for anyone seeking to understand dynamics of race and racial inequality in America.
Written by: Beverly Daniel Tatum
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The Inconvenient Indian
- A Curious Account of Native People in North America
- Written by: Thomas King
- Narrated by: Lorne Cardinal
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The Inconvenient Indian is at once a “history” and the complete subversion of a history - in short, a critical and personal meditation that the remarkable Thomas King has conducted over the past 50 years about what it means to be “Indian” in North America. Rich with dark and light, pain and magic, this book distills the insights gleaned from that meditation, weaving the curiously circular tale of the relationship between non-Natives and Natives in the centuries since the two first encountered each other.
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Angry, embarrassed, disgusted, horrified, nauseous, scared and so so sad, but hopeful and now informed.
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Policing Black Lives
- State Violence in Canada from Slavery to the Present
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Delving behind Canada’s veneer of multiculturalism and tolerance, Policing Black Lives traces the violent realities of anti-Blackness from the slave ships to prisons, classrooms, and beyond. Robyn Maynard provides listeners with the first comprehensive account of nearly 400 years of state-sanctioned surveillance, criminalization, and punishment of Black lives in Canada. While highlighting the ubiquity of Black resistance, Policing Black Lives traces the still-living legacy of slavery across multiple institutions.
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Eye opening!
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Why I'm No Longer Talking to White People About Race
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In February 2014, Reni Eddo-Lodge posted an impassioned argument on her blog about her deep-seated frustration with the way discussions of race and racism in Britain were constantly being shut down by those who weren't affected by it. She gave the post the title 'Why I'm No Longer Talking to White People About Race'. Her sharp, fiercely intelligent words hit a nerve, and the post went viral, spawning a huge number of comments from people desperate to speak up about their own similar experiences.
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Thank you, Reni. Now what?
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Written by: Reni Eddo-Lodge
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Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You
- A Remix of the National Book Award-Winning Stamped from the Beginning
- Written by: Jason Reynolds, Ibram X. Kendi
- Narrated by: Jason Reynolds, Ibram X. Kendi - introduction
- Length: 4 hrs and 11 mins
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The construct of race has always been used to gain and keep power, to create dynamics that separate and silence. This remarkable reimagining of Dr. Ibram X. Kendi's National Book Award-winning Stamped from the Beginning reveals the history of racist ideas in America, and inspires hope for an antiracist future. It takes you on a race journey from then to now, shows you why we feel how we feel, and why the poison of racism lingers. It also proves that while racist ideas have always been easy to fabricate and distribute, they can also be discredited.
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The alternate history book
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Written by: Jason Reynolds, and others
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Between the World and Me
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Americans have built an empire on the idea of “race”, a falsehood that damages us all but falls most heavily on the bodies of Black women and men - bodies exploited through slavery and segregation and, today, threatened, locked up, and murdered out of all proportion. What is it like to inhabit a Black body and find a way to live within it? And how can we all honestly reckon with this fraught history and free ourselves from its burden? Between the World and Me is Ta-Nehisi Coates’ attempt to answer these questions in a letter to his adolescent son.
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what a book that was
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Written by: Ta-Nehisi Coates
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Braiding Sweetgrass
- Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants
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As a botanist and professor of plant ecology, Robin Wall Kimmerer has spent a career learning how to ask questions of nature using the tools of science. As a Potawatomi woman, she learned from elders, family, and history that the Potawatomi, as well as a majority of other cultures indigenous to this land, consider plants and animals to be our oldest teachers.
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Fabulous wise, informative, inspiring, beautifully written book!
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Ain't I a Woman
- Black Women and Feminism (2nd Edition)
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A classic work of feminist scholarship, Ain't I a Woman has become a must for all those interested in the nature of Black womanhood. Examining the impact of sexism on Black women during slavery, the devaluation of black womanhood, black male sexism, racism among feminists, and the black woman's involvement with feminism, hooks attempts to move us beyond racist and sexist assumptions. The result is nothing short of groundbreaking, giving this work a critical place in every feminist scholar's library.
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Historical
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Written by: bell hooks
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Stamped from the Beginning
- The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America
- Written by: Ibram X. Kendi
- Narrated by: Christopher Dontrell Piper
- Length: 19 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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Some Americans cling desperately to the myth that we are living in a post-racial society, that the election of the first Black president spelled the doom of racism. In fact, racist thought is alive and well in America - more sophisticated and more insidious than ever. And as award-winning historian Ibram X. Kendi argues in Stamped from the Beginning, if we have any hope of grappling with this stark reality, we must first understand how racist ideas were developed, disseminated, and enshrined in American society.
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A must read!!!
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Written by: Ibram X. Kendi
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They Said This Would Be Fun
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- Unabridged
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A booksmart kid from Toronto, Eternity Martis was excited to move away to Western University for her undergraduate degree. But as one of the few Black students there, she soon discovered that the campus experiences she'd seen in movies were far more complex in reality. Over the next four years, Eternity learned more about what someone like her brought out in other people than she did about herself. She was confronted by White students in blackface at parties, dealt with being the only person of colour in class and was tokenized by her romantic partners.
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This reframed my perspective about London, ON
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Written by: Eternity Martis
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Caste (Oprah's Book Club)
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- Narrated by: Robin Miles
- Length: 14 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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In this brilliant book, Isabel Wilkerson gives us a masterful portrait of an unseen phenomenon in America as she explores, through an immersive, deeply researched narrative and stories about real people, how America today and throughout its history has been shaped by a hidden caste system, a rigid hierarchy of human rankings. Beautifully written, original, and revealing, Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents is an eye-opening story of people and history, and a reexamination of what lies under the surface of ordinary lives and of American life today.
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Very good, but some unnecessary chapters
- By Richard Morrison on 2020-09-13
Written by: Isabel Wilkerson
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Anti-Racist Psychotherapy: Confronting Systemic Racism and Healing Racial Trauma
- Written by: David Archer
- Narrated by: David Archer
- Length: 5 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
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Transform your understanding of racial trauma. Anti-Racist Psychotherapy is an approach designed to clarify the mental health effects of racism and provide a neuroscience-informed approach to resolve racial trauma. This audiobook will help you learn a new and unique perspective for conceptualizing racism and recovering from its effects on the nervous system.
Written by: David Archer
Publisher's Summary
Number one New York Times best seller
From the National Book Award-winning author of Stamped from the Beginning comes a “groundbreaking” (Time) approach to understanding and uprooting racism and inequality in our society - and in ourselves.
“The most courageous book to date on the problem of race in the Western mind.” (The New York Times)
Named One of the Best Books of the Year by: The New York Times Book Review • Time • The Washington Post • Shelf Awareness • Library Journal • Publishers Weekly • Kirkus Reviews
Antiracism is a transformative concept that reorients and reenergizes the conversation about racism - and, even more fundamentally, points us toward liberating new ways of thinking about ourselves and each other. At its core, racism is a powerful system that creates false hierarchies of human value; its warped logic extends beyond race, from the way we regard people of different ethnicities or skin colors to the way we treat people of different sexes, gender identities, and body types. Racism intersects with class and culture and geography and even changes the way we see and value ourselves. In How to Be an Antiracist, Kendi takes listeners through a widening circle of antiracist ideas - from the most basic concepts to visionary possibilities - that will help listeners see all forms of racism clearly, understand their poisonous consequences, and work to oppose them in our systems and in ourselves.
Kendi weaves an electrifying combination of ethics, history, law, and science with his own personal story of awakening to antiracism. This is an essential work for anyone who wants to go beyond the awareness of racism to the next step: contributing to the formation of a just and equitable society.
Praise for How to Be an Antiracist
“Ibram X. Kendi’s new book, How to Be an Antiracist, couldn’t come at a better time.... Kendi has gifted us with a book that is not only an essential instruction manual but also a memoir of the author’s own path from anti-black racism to anti-white racism and, finally, to antiracism.... How to Be an Antiracist gives us a clear and compelling way to approach, as Kendi puts it in his introduction, ‘the basic struggle we’re all in, the struggle to be fully human and to see that others are fully human.’” (NPR)
“Kendi dissects why in a society where so few people consider themselves to be racist the divisions and inequalities of racism remain so prevalent. How to Be an Antiracist punctures the myths of a post-racial America, examining what racism really is - and what we should do about it.” (Time)
What the critics say
“Ibram Kendi’s work, through both his books and the Antiracist Research and Policy Center, is vital in today’s sociopolitical climate. As a society, we need to start treating antiracism as action, not emotion - and Kendi is helping us do that.” (Ijeoma Oluo, author of So You Want to Talk About Race)
“A boldly articulated, historically informed explanation of what exactly racist ideas and thinking are...[Kendi’s] prose is thoughtful, sincere, and polished. This powerful book will spark many conversations.” (Publishers Weekly, starred review)
“A combination of memoir and extension of [Kendi’s] towering Stamped from the Beginning.... Never wavering...Kendi methodically examines racism through numerous lenses: power, biology, ethnicity, body, culture, and so forth.... This unsparing honesty helps readers, both white and people of color, navigate this difficult intellectual territory.... Essential.” (Kirkus Reviews, starred review)
“In this sharp blend of social commentary and memoir...Kendi is ready to spread his message, his stories serving as a springboard for potent explorations of race, gender, colorism, and more.... With Stamped from the Beginning, Kendi proved himself a first-rate historian. Here, his willingness to turn the lens on himself marks him as a courageous activist, leading the way to a more equitable society.” (Library Journal, starred review)
More from the same
What listeners say about How to Be an Antiracist
Average Customer RatingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Ashleigh
- 2020-06-03
Should be required reading
This book should be required reading for everyone. The author reads with measured passion, deep honesty, and provides much history and material to help readers to spread the importance of being antiracist. I do not understand the previous review about voice actors. I don’t think there could have been a better voice to convey this message than the author’s own.
HIGHLY RECOMMEND!
17 people found this helpful
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- Deanna Nilson
- 2020-06-03
Highly recommended!
Excellent reading for anyone looking to understand more about how to be an ally to BIPOC. Should be required reading for white folks. I love that it’s read by the author himself and he does an excellent job with it!
11 people found this helpful
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- Jeff
- 2020-06-17
good content, bad narration
The contents of the book were very eye opening and I learned a lot as a result. it really helped with understanding a side of the story I hadn't before
However, the narrator, often, randomly pauses, while he reads. As if there are commas like in the sentence above. It's quite aggregvating at times.
5 people found this helpful
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- Thomas L
- 2020-06-04
Clear Eyed, Honest, and Vital
Stamped from the Beginning is a masterpiece of history, and this is a masterpiece of political and social thought. Be open to his ideas, and open to change.
4 people found this helpful
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- Melanie Persaud
- 2020-07-20
READ this one
Dr. Kendi is brilliant and you will learn so much by reading this book. I’m going to pick up a print copy. Unfortunately I found Dr. Kendi’s style of narration distracting. It is halting with odd phrasing like he didn’t know what word cane next. There are also times when his passion is high pitched and uncomfortable to listen to. Not sure where the Director was but I don’t think everyone who writes a brilliant book should read it. The content however is insightful and quite accessible as Dr. Kendi pairs it with his own awakening. Great. He deserves all the accolades.
2 people found this helpful
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- pigletbunny
- 2020-06-27
NECESSARY reading, for ALL ethnicities/colours
This book is PERFECT!!! It being read by the author is the icing on the cake. Kendi does an EXCELLENT job of explaining simply, but without condescending to us (and with facts to back up what he says), the history of Blacks in America, the history of White racism in America, the ways in which racism has affected Blacks and Whites and others, and what this has to do with all of us, now. Kendi does not shy away from examining Black racism, nor both purposeful and inadvertent ways that Blacks have aided Whites in oppressing fellow Blacks. Impressively, Kendi freely admits his history of expressing and assisting racism against Blacks, beginning when he was a youth.
How to Be an Antiracist is also VERY relevant to Canada.
2 people found this helpful
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- C. L. Peressotti
- 2021-02-16
Describes the problem and the solution
This is the fourth book I listened to on this topic and it’s now my favorite. It’s exhaustive in cataloging the flavors of racism and anti-racism, and I love how it comes together at the end: you don’t end racism by changing minds, but by changing racist policies to anti-racist policies. (This is stated in the earliest chapters, but, by the end of the book, you have the context to truly believe it.)
One caveat: if you’re looking for your first book discussing race and racism, You may want to first check out So You Want to Talk About Race by Ijeoma Oluo. I think it’s a more accessible introduction.
1 person found this helpful
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- Kelly Sarlo
- 2020-10-02
Wish I Bought The Book
This is a must-read for every person of every race and ethnicity! It is the perfect education and call to action! I only wish I had purchased the physical book 1) because I believe it would be beneficial to have pages to reference so I could deep-dive into the policies he refers to and 2) because it was the most painful thing to listen to. There is so much staccato, I’d highly suggest listening at 1.3x the speed!
Nevertheless, this is an outstanding book. I absolutely love and admire Ibram’s organization and presentation of ideas!
1 person found this helpful
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- Charlotte Evans
- 2022-05-08
Everyone should read this book!
I have learned a lot from this book and will use it as a guide to help me be an anti racist as well
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- Siobhan Gormley
- 2022-05-07
Important read
While some sections of the book were difficult to hear, it is a book that I felt was necessary for me as I go through my journey toward being an anti-racist. I appreciated the way the author connected his own experiences with the theme of the chapter, it made it more personal.
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- Anonymous User
- 2020-03-09
80% of the useful content is in the first 1-2 chapters
The concept that there is no such thing as “not racist” (i.e. race-neutral policies) but only racist or anti-racist policies was extremely well articulated, useful and important.
After that, however, there was extremely limited discussion of what those actual policies are, HOW to support anti-racist policies, HOW to identify implicitly racist policies or HOW to develop anti-racist policies.
As a well-meaning, previously-not-racist-now-anti-racist white guy with a leadership position, I was looking for recommendations for how I could develop anti-racist policies and how I could identify policies (that are not overtly racist) as covertly racist.
The best I could find in this book is a recommendation to tip the scales toward previously oppressed races, sexualities, genders, etc., affirmative action style.
I agree such a finger on the scales is needed for many social policies and am working to implement that recommendation in my sphere of influence. However, I don’t see how that action is ANTI-racist: it is medium-term compensation for a history of racist policies. This book seems to argue for racist policy favoring black people, sexist policy favoring women, gender-identity discriminatory policy favoring LGBTQ+ people, etc. ...all needed and appropriate to support now, but not at all describing HOW to see racist policies for what they are and HOW to develop policies to combat them.
For example (my suggestion), in health care, black people have traditionally encountered barriers to access to care. Should we develop an anti-racist policy that prioritizes black patient appointment scheduling and bump whites from the schedule if a black wants/needs that appointment slot? If so, HOW would such a policy be operationalized? HOW would we mitigate the delirious effect on the one white body (person) who was affected each time the policy was employed? HOW should we think about such an effort?
This book needed more explicit examples, case studies of policies that worked or failed, recommendations for how I, should change to be helpful.
Instead this book shared a compelling, useful concept up front and ultimately was a frustrating read because of the lost opportunity to actually answer the question posed by the title.
227 people found this helpful
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- Michelle Russell
- 2020-06-07
Came far but more to go...
I listened for as long as I could but I'm getting my credit back for this. He seems like a nice man who has come far but has far-left views, too. Began with contempt for the president, then into a belief about how to create fair laws you must create unfair laws to play catch-up. He talked about Alzheimers and cancer striking more blacks as though health problems amongst blacks are purposeful, I was struggling to continue. Does this man think even diseases see his skin color and target blacks as a people? He regurgitates leftist views and statistics but doesn't think or follow them through. Yes, twice as many blacks are turned down for mortgages as whites. Is that racist? Well, twice as many whites are turned down for mortgages as Asians. That's not racist. It's a fact. The fact that Asians "who apply for mortgages" have higher credit scores than whites who apply for mortgages and whites who apply for mortgages have higher credit scores than blacks who apply for mortgages should be addressed. The same holds true for the majority of his statistics. How things relate to black and white does not always tell the complete story and may skew statistics and results. I would read instead, Intellectuals and Race. Much better and well thought out than this. I also hope this man opens his mind just a little more to dig deeper into the figures and compare ALL the data as things relate to one another.
199 people found this helpful
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- James Page
- 2020-06-11
Heavily Biased
Kendi projects a lot throughout the book, and I found a majority of his evidence of racism to be anecdotal.
Don't get me wrong, there's a centuries-long legacy of segregation in the USA, but Kendi doesn't provide an objective view of how racism and segregation became, nor how they can be resolved.
If you seek an objective view, then I urge you to consider reading "The Color Of Law" by Richard Rothstein.
100 people found this helpful
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- Jessica
- 2020-03-03
Excellent book, but don't get the Audible version.
A brilliant book that deserves good narration. I'm guessing that the author had reasons for the odd cadence, occasional staccato paragraphs, and constant misplaced pauses of his reading, but I can't fathom what they are. It made it really hard to finish without sending this one back for a refund. I urge the author to consider re-recording this. People need to read this book, or hear it, if they prefer, but this reading is truly awful.
95 people found this helpful
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- Adam Shields
- 2019-08-24
Racism is a cancer
Summary: A personal, memoir informed, look at the difference between being ’not racist’ and an antiracist.
I picked up How to Be an Antiracist almost immediately after I finished Stamped From the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America. They are very different in approach. Stamped from the beginning is more academic, much longer, and more historical. How to be an Antiracist is much shorter, more personal and, in a helpful way, not academic.
Despite it being shorter and less academic, I think this is a book I am going to need to read again, while I doubt I will re-read Stamped from the Beginning. How to be an Antiracist is making subtle changes to the recent Critical Race Theory informed definitions of racism. And while I think I mostly agree with Kendi’s critiques, I also think I need to both re-read this book to be sure I understand what he is doing, and read some others responding to him to make sure I am not missing some of the implications of his critiques.
At the most basic, Kendi is rejecting the prejudice plus power definition of racism. At the same time, he is rejecting racist as a descriptor of a person. He wants racist to be the descriptor of the idea or action. “A racist idea is any idea that suggests one racial group is inferior or superior to another racial group in any way.” Similarly, “A racist policy is any measure that produces or sustains racial inequity between racial groups.” In another place, “What is racism? Racism is a marriage of racist policies and racist ideas that produces and normalizes racial inequities…Racial inequity is when two or more racial groups are not standing on approximately equal footing.”
Kendi uses the metaphor of racism not as an identity (or tattoo), you either are or are not racist, but a sticky name tag that you put on and take off. He is unequivocal that anyone can express racist ideas or perform racist actions. And he is not at all rejecting the concept of racism as a systemic reality. He does not like the term systemic racism (because it is too vague). He wants to concentrate on ‘racist policies.’
“A racist policy is any measure that produces or sustains racial inequity between racial groups. An antiracist policy is any measure that produces or sustains racial equity between racial groups. By policy, I mean written and unwritten laws, rules, procedures, processes, regulations, and guidelines that govern people. There is no such thing as a nonracist or race-neutral policy. Every policy in every institution in every community in every nation is producing or sustaining either racial inequity or equity between racial groups.”
There will, I think, be several White people that are opposed to the Critical Race Theory line of thinking about racism that wants to embrace a part of Kendi’s point. They will like that anyone can express racist ideas or actions. But will not understand Kendi’s more significant point that the movement to antiracism is rooted in the empowerment of Black and other minorities. Kendi’s position is not that Blacks can be racist against Whites, but that Blacks can be racist against other Black people. Kendi is not empowering the idea of ‘reverse racism’ but expanding racism to included Black people being racist against other Black people or other minorities.
Throughout How to Be an Antiracist, Kendi talks about three approaches. In general, people are or have been, segregationists, assimilationists, or antiracists. Segregationists want to maintain separate racial hierarchies. Assimilationists wish to break down legal segregation, but also do not go far enough in breaking down the internal understanding of racial superiority. Assimilationists want acceptance and often are willing to have either partial approval or behavior-based acceptance of some, as opposed to all. In Kendi’s approach, segregationists and assimilationists are both forms of racism. It is only antiracists that are focused not just on legal segregation and discrimination, but also on internal feelings of superiority or inferiority that move society beyond racism.
Antiracism, like feminism in its ideals, is not about reversing the patriarchy or racial hierarchy, but about equality. To be antiracist in Kendi’s ideal means to not only be opposed to racism and for racial equality, but also to be against division based on, “gender, sexuality, class, ethnicity, skin color, nationality, and culture, among a series of other identifiers.” To be antiracist means that you are also an antisexist, against religious discrimination, against xenophobia, etc.
Kendi is also not interested in suasion.
“The original problem of racism has not been solved by suasion. Knowledge is only power if knowledge is put to the struggle for power. Changing minds is not a movement. Critiquing racism is not activism. Changing minds is not activism. An activist produces power and policy change, not mental change. If a person has no record of power or policy change, then that person is not an activist.”
When I say this book is personal, I mean that. Kendi uses his own life primarily as an example of moving from racism to antiracism. He talks about how he, at one point, had adopted the racist ideas against other Black people that were common at the time and won a speech competition by reciting them. He talks about anger and hatred against White people for both the historical harm and the continued indifference to racism. He talks about his own internalized sexism and homophobia. In each of these areas and more, he came to realized that a sense of superiority or alienation, no matter how large or small, perpetuates differences and violates the antiracist ideal.
The end of the book is the most personal. Kendi recounts how soon after they were married, his wife developed breast cancer. Together they walked through that cancer and instead of being newlyweds and she starting her medical career after 12 years of preparation to become a doctor, she became a cancer patient. And then not long after his wife was cancer-free, he was diagnosed with stage 4 colon cancer.
Cancer becomes the metaphor for racism at the end. Racism has embedded itself in our society. It is spreading and distorting culture and if it is not rooted out, not just in the racial aspects, but the sexism, xenophobia, homophobia, etc., it will continue to metastasize and transform. According to an interview on NPR I heard last week, his cancer is in remission for now, but he has a very high likelihood of reoccurrence, and he is not fooling around because he is not sure how long he will be alive to oppose racism.
180 people found this helpful
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- Anonymous User
- 2020-07-01
Tadical Leftist Thinking
This young man is educated and angry. He assumes so much and reaches for conclusions. He is reading his own material and you clearly hear all his anger as he starts quietly and then spews. Maybe better reading material but this is his own memoir and he invites you into his own vocabulary and definitions of racism. I found it offensive and racist. He is arrogant in his assumptions. Couldn’t finish as he could never bring it down out of the ivory tower. His writing displays his own privilege and he sees the world through a binary lens.
56 people found this helpful
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- Amazon Customer
- 2020-05-06
Essential reading for the Not Racist
Should be required reading for everyone born since the 15th century - yes, that is you and me! If you are tired of wondering how we got to where we are now, and you are frustrated by not seeing much progress and wondering why - then this book is for you.
54 people found this helpful
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- steve
- 2020-07-07
Overly Biased undermines credibility.
A few good thoughts were presented but his rambling contradictions and falsehoods make it hard to take serious.
51 people found this helpful
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- Jamie Simons
- 2020-01-22
loved it but...
As a member of a minority that has been persecuted for thousands of years, i identified with everything he wrote but his conclusion. My own people's experience would say u can be perfect, brilliant, add to the world culturally, scientifically, u name it but it all doesnt matter in the long run. People will hate just because they do. Cynical, i know but my peoples sad experience. It's like the whole human race needs to start over and labels of others cannot be allowed if we r to live together peacefully. still, a book well worth reading.
50 people found this helpful
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- Bret
- 2020-02-20
Having a hard time with the performance
Kendi seems to have taken inspiration for his performance from Christopher Walken, which gives the sense that he's not reading his own book. Occasionally he starts talking through the words, and those moments are strong, but most of the read has a 2-word beat that is awkwardly disconnected from the meaning behind the words.
45 people found this helpful