Books & DVDs
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Under the Affluence: Shaming the Poor, Praising the Rich and Sacrificing the Future of America In his latest book, Tim Wise explores the increasingly cruel rhetoric and public policy aimed at the poor and working class in America, along with the often uncritical praise for the wealthy, both of which serve to rationalize and cement in place longstanding (and widening) gaps between the nation’s haves and have-nots. Contrary to popular belief, the poor are not poor because of cultural or behavioral pathologies, and neither are the wealthy in their position because of superior talent or hard work, let alone a better value system. If anything, as Wise demonstrates herein, it is the values of predatory affluence manifested by the powerful that threaten the society in which we live. This powerful new volume examines both the historical roots of race and class inequality and what it will take to emerge from “under the affluence,” in a growing culture of cruelty. Read More >> |
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Dear White America: Letter to a New Minority In America, being white has long meant never having to think about race. Whites have been able to assume that the culture, political leadership and their own neighborhoods would “look like them,” and the economy would work for them, so long as they played by the rules. Now, facing chronic economic insecurity, a multicultural pop culture, a black president and a future in which they will no longer be the majority, whites are growing anxious. This anxiety has helped create the Tea Party phenomenon and is characterized by the call to “take the country back” to a mythologized past. Read More >> |
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White Like Me: Reflections on Race from a Privileged Son In this completely revised, “Remix” version of his highly-acclaimed memoir, White Like Me, Tim Wise explores how racial identity and whiteness influence the lives of white Americans, by examining how they have impacted his own life. Wise examines what it means to be white in a nation created for the benefit of those who are “white like him,” and how privilege seeps into every institutional arrangement, from education to employment to the justice system. Read More >> |
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Color Blind: The Rise of Post-Racial Politics and the Retreat from Racial Equity In this powerful follow-up to Between Barack and a Hard Place, Tim Wise argues against “colorblindness†and for a deeper color-consciousness in both public and private practice. We can only begin to move toward authentic social and economic equity through what Wise calls “illuminated individualism”—acknowledging the diverse identities that have shaped our perceptions, and the role that race continues to play in the maintenance of disparities between whites and people of color in the United States today. This is the first book to discuss the pitfalls of “colorblindness†in the Obama era. Read More >> |
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Between Barack and a Hard Place: Racism and White Denial in the Age of Obama Wise pushes plenty of buttons in this methodical breakdown of racism’s place in the wake of Barack Obama’s victory. In the first of two essays, the author obliterates the canard of the US as a post-racial society; bigotry and insititutionalized discrimination, he contends, have simply morphed into “Racism 2.0,” in which successful minorities are celebrated “as having ‘transcended’ their blackness in some way.” Read More >> |
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Speaking Treason Fluently: Anti-Racist Reflections From an Angry White Male Speaking Treason Fluently is an examination of the way in which racial privilege shapes the lives of white Americans, in every realm of daily life: employment, education, housing, criminal justice, and elsewhere. Drawing on a wide range of anecdote and data, Tim Wise demonstrates the numerous ways in which racism not only burdens people of color, but also discusses the ways in which racial privilege can harm whites in the long run, and make progressive social change less likely. Read More >> |
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Affirmative Action: Racial Preference in Black and White Affirmative Action examines the larger structure of institutional white privilege in education, and compares the magnitude of white racial preference with the policies typically envisioned when the term “racial preference” is used. In doing so, the book demonstrates that the American system of education is both a reflection of and a contributor to a structure of institutionalized racism and racial preference for the dominant majority. Read More >> |
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DVD – Tim Wise: On White Privilege: Racism, White Denial & the Cost of Inequality In this spellbinding lecture, delivered at Mt. Holyoke College in October 2007, Tim Wise, offers a unique, inside-out view of race and racism in America. Expertly overcoming the defensiveness that often surrounds these issues, Wise provides a hard-hitting, yet non-confrontational explanation of white privilege and the damage it does not only to people of color, but to white people as well. Read More >> |
