Here are 100 books that Racial Formation in the United States fans have personally recommended if you like
Racial Formation in the United States.
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I'm Associate Professor of Economics at Washington and Lee University in Virginia, USA. My expertise is in conflict, war, and peace economics. I'm deeply motivated to understand the broader impacts of violent conflicts in low-income countries with the hope that doing so will pave the way for us to live in a more harmonious world. Recently, I've been interested in economics of cultural heritage destruction during violent conflicts. My aim is to understand patterns of heritage destruction in the past such that we can incorporate heritage destruction in atrocity forecasting models of today. I'm just as passionate to teach what I have learned over the years and what I'm curious to explore in the future.
In this book we learn that our actions are shaped by that of others or by our expectation of what others will do.
If, for example, a white neighbor leaves the neighborhood upon seeing a minority family move in, other white neighbors are likely to follow suit if they expect more white neighbors to move out and more minorities to move in. If a critical mass of white neighbors adopts this behavior, the result is a segregated neighborhood.
Applied this idea to the study of mass atrocities, we understand mass participation in mass atrocities as not a result of moral failure, but a social phenomenon driven by imitating nature and belonging need of the humankind. This understanding humanizes the mass perpetrators of an atrocity and opens space for reconciliation.
"Schelling here offers an early analysis of 'tipping' in social situations involving a large number of individuals." -official citation for the 2005 Nobel Prize
Micromotives and Macrobehavior was originally published over twenty-five years ago, yet the stories it tells feel just as fresh today. And the subject of these stories-how small and seemingly meaningless decisions and actions by individuals often lead to significant unintended consequences for a large group-is more important than ever. In one famous example, Thomas C. Schelling shows that a slight-but-not-malicious preference to have neighbors of the same race eventually leads to completely segregated populations.
Magical realism meets the magic of Christmas in this mix of Jewish, New Testament, and Santa stories–all reenacted in an urban psychiatric hospital!
On locked ward 5C4, Josh, a patient with many similarities to Jesus, is hospitalized concurrently with Nick, a patient with many similarities to Santa. The two argue…
I am an engaged scholar fighting racism. As a person of color, an Asian American raised in Chinatown and a low-income Black neighborhood, the fight is personal. My parents and those before them suffered from and struggled against discriminatory immigration laws that fractured and separated family members. My research and publications as a university professor are tools for exposing and redressing racial injustices, producing and sharing knowledge that leads to reconciliation and restorative justice.
Renowned geographer Soja presents an intriguing interpretation of the underlying forces shaping the urban landscape.
Using a blend of critical and postmodern theories, he reconceptualizes the meaning, organization, and use of space in the production of societal inequality within capitalist societies, including but not limited to race.
Equally important to me is the discussion about the system’s inherent contradictions and the phenomenon of active resistance against repression.
Contemporary critical studies have recently experienced a significant spatial turn. In what may eventually be seen as one of the most important intellectual and political developments in the late twentieth century, scholars have begun to interpret space and the embracing spatiality of human life with the same critical insight and emphasis that has traditionally been given to time and history on the one hand, and social relations and society on the other. Thirdspace is both an enquiry into the origins and impact of the spatial turn and an attempt to expand the scope and practical relevance of how we think…
I am an engaged scholar fighting racism. As a person of color, an Asian American raised in Chinatown and a low-income Black neighborhood, the fight is personal. My parents and those before them suffered from and struggled against discriminatory immigration laws that fractured and separated family members. My research and publications as a university professor are tools for exposing and redressing racial injustices, producing and sharing knowledge that leads to reconciliation and restorative justice.
Schlosberg covers the environment as an important sphere for societal inequalities, including those along racial lines.
People of color bear a disproportionate share of air, water, and land pollution and risk being left behind as the United States transitions to renewable energy in response to climate change.
Much of the inequality is anchored in stratified places. The author not only summarizes the existing literature on this, but also provides a very useful overview of the major justice paradigms as it applies to the environment.
This book will appeal to anyone interested in environmental politics, environmental movements, and justice theory.
The basic task of this book is to explore what, exactly, is meant by 'justice' in definitions of environmental and ecological justice. It examines how the term is used in both self-described environmental justice movements and in theories of environmental and ecological justice. The central argument is that a theory and practice of environmental justice necessarily includes distributive conceptions of justice, but must also embrace notions of justice based in recognition, capabilities, and participation. Throughout, the goal is the development of a broad, multi-faceted, yet…
Stealing technology from parallel Earths was supposed to make Declan rich. Instead, it might destroy everything.
Declan is a self-proclaimed interdimensional interloper, travelling to parallel Earths to retrieve futuristic cutting-edge technology for his employer. It's profitable work, and he doesn't ask questions. But when he befriends an amazing humanoid robot,…
I am an engaged scholar fighting racism. As a person of color, an Asian American raised in Chinatown and a low-income Black neighborhood, the fight is personal. My parents and those before them suffered from and struggled against discriminatory immigration laws that fractured and separated family members. My research and publications as a university professor are tools for exposing and redressing racial injustices, producing and sharing knowledge that leads to reconciliation and restorative justice.
This book provides a grand sociological theoretical framework to explain how society creates and maintains persistent inequality through grouping.
The author does not anchor his explanation in individual biases and discriminatory acts, which are manifestations of larger fundamental structures and dynamics. The division and organization of the population into categories produce systemic group advantages and enable hierarchical exploitation.
Several organizational mechanisms within and between groups make categorical inequality durable. Race is one of the fundamental ways society is fragmented into enduring and unequal groups.
Charles Tilly, in this eloquent manifesto, presents a powerful new approach to the study of persistent social inequality. How, he asks, do long-lasting, systematic inequalities in life chances arise, and how do they come to distinguish members of different socially defined categories of persons? Exploring representative paired and unequal categories, such as male/female, black/white, and citizen/noncitizen, Tilly argues that the basic causes of these and similar inequalities greatly resemble one another. In contrast to contemporary analyses that explain inequality case by case, this account is one of process. Categorical distinctions arise, Tilly says, because they offer a solution to pressing…
After hearing scholars argue that the “Latinx” category is solely an ethnicity, not a race, I questioned my assumption that “Latinx” was a race—and this led me to ask, “What is race?” To answer this, I read extensively, reflecting on my education and experience as a high school Spanish teacher. At the time, I was also studying a bilingual education program, and I started noticing how the program socially constructed race and the Latinx racialized group. Now, as a UCLA professor researching and teaching about Latinx education, I’m sharing insights in my book, a book that helps readers rethink race and see how schools construct Latinidad.
I picked up this book because I was struggling to make sense of the different ways race is theorized in education. Zeus Leonardo’s work blew me away—it’s like he handed me a map to navigate the complexities of race frameworks. He breaks down four major approaches, critiques their limitations, and then introduces his own concept of “race ambivalence,” which completely shifted my perspective.
What I love most is how Leonardo doesn’t just theorize; he challenges readers to think critically about how these frameworks play out in real life. This book isn’t just for educators—it’s for anyone who wants to understand the nuances of race in society. It’s a book I keep coming back to, and it’s one I always recommend to friends who are ready to dig deeper.
This is a comprehensive introduction to the main frameworks for thinking about, conducting research on, and teaching about race and racism in education. Renowned theoretician and philosopher Zeus Leonardo surveys the dominant race theories and, more specifically, focuses on those frameworks that are considered essential to cultivating a critical attitude toward race and racism. The book examines four frameworks: Critical Race Theory (CRT), Marxism, Whiteness Studies, and Cultural Studies, with a critique following each one in order to analyze its strengths and set its limits. The last chapter offers a theory of "race ambivalence," which combines aspects of all four…
After hearing scholars argue that the “Latinx” category is solely an ethnicity, not a race, I questioned my assumption that “Latinx” was a race—and this led me to ask, “What is race?” To answer this, I read extensively, reflecting on my education and experience as a high school Spanish teacher. At the time, I was also studying a bilingual education program, and I started noticing how the program socially constructed race and the Latinx racialized group. Now, as a UCLA professor researching and teaching about Latinx education, I’m sharing insights in my book, a book that helps readers rethink race and see how schools construct Latinidad.
This book taught me how the idea of “Hispanic” as a group was constructed—not as a natural category but as a deliberate effort by activists, bureaucrats, and the media. Cristina Mora’s research shows how power and influence created this category, challenging the assumption that commonality binds this group together.
Reading it helped me see that the creation of the Hispanic category is both intentional and ongoing, which deeply influenced how I think about race and racialization in my own work. If you’ve ever wondered how racial and ethnic categories come to be, this book is a must-read. It’s a powerful reminder that categories are not fixed but shaped by history, politics, and power.
How did Puerto Ricans, Mexicans, and Cubans become known as "Hispanics" and "Latinos" in the United States? How did several distinct cultures and nationalities become portrayed as one? Cristina Mora answers both these questions and details the scope of this phenomenon in Making Hispanics. She uses an organizational lens and traces how activists, bureaucrats, and media executives in the 1970s and '80s created a new identity category-and by doing so, permanently changed the racial and political landscape of the nation. Some argue that these cultures are fundamentally similar and that the Spanish language is a natural basis for a unified…
Nature writer Sharman Apt Russell tells stories of her experiences tracking wildlife—mostly mammals, from mountain lions to pocket mice—near her home in New Mexico, with lessons that hold true across North America. She guides readers through the basics of identifying tracks and signs, revealing a landscape filled with the marks…
After hearing scholars argue that the “Latinx” category is solely an ethnicity, not a race, I questioned my assumption that “Latinx” was a race—and this led me to ask, “What is race?” To answer this, I read extensively, reflecting on my education and experience as a high school Spanish teacher. At the time, I was also studying a bilingual education program, and I started noticing how the program socially constructed race and the Latinx racialized group. Now, as a UCLA professor researching and teaching about Latinx education, I’m sharing insights in my book, a book that helps readers rethink race and see how schools construct Latinidad.
Laura Gómez’s work has been foundational to my thinking about race and the Latinx community. While I also love her book Inventing Latinos, I chose Manifest Destinies because it directly answers a question one of my students once asked me: “Is Mexican American a race?”
This book is a powerful account of how the "Mexican American” racial category was created through historical and legal processes, conquest, and social struggle. When I read it, I was struck by how Gómez provides the foundation for understanding the origins of what we now call the Latinx category. If you want to understand the roots of the Latinx racial category in the U.S., this book is essential.
An essential resource for understanding the complex history of Mexican Americans and racial classification in the United States
Manifest Destinies tells the story of the original Mexican Americans-the people living in northern Mexico in 1846 during the onset of the Mexican American War. The war abruptly came to an end two years later, and 115,000 Mexicans became American citizens overnight. Yet their status as full-fledged Americans was tenuous at best. Due to a variety of legal and political maneuvers, Mexican Americans were largely confined to a second class status. How did this categorization occur, and what are the implications for…
After hearing scholars argue that the “Latinx” category is solely an ethnicity, not a race, I questioned my assumption that “Latinx” was a race—and this led me to ask, “What is race?” To answer this, I read extensively, reflecting on my education and experience as a high school Spanish teacher. At the time, I was also studying a bilingual education program, and I started noticing how the program socially constructed race and the Latinx racialized group. Now, as a UCLA professor researching and teaching about Latinx education, I’m sharing insights in my book, a book that helps readers rethink race and see how schools construct Latinidad.
After I finished writing my book, a friend recommended Osagie Obasogie’s book, and I’m so grateful they did! Obasogie challenges readers—and scholars—to rethink race in a way that goes beyond the usual nod to it being a social construct.
Through his groundbreaking research with individuals who have been blind since birth, he shows how race is not just something visual but something we learn to “see.” It’s a must-read for anyone who wants to move beyond surface-level discussions of race and grapple with its deeper implications. Obasogie’s book helped me complicate my understanding of race as a construct, and it has stayed with me, shaping how I think and write about race today.
Colorblindness has become an integral part of the national conversation on race in America. Given the assumptions behind this influential metaphor-that being blind to race will lead to racial equality-it's curious that, until now, we have not considered if or how the blind "see" race. Most sighted people assume that the answer is obvious: they don't, and are therefore incapable of racial bias-an example that the sighted community should presumably follow. In Blinded by Sight,Osagie K. Obasogie shares a startling observation made during discussions with people from all walks of life who have been blind since birth: even the blind…
At school I fell in love philosophy. But at university, as I grew older, I started to feel out of place: all the authors we read were men. I loved Plato, but there was something missing. It didn’t occur to me until I was in my thirties to look for women in the history of philosophy! I read Wollstonecraft first, then Olympe de Gouges, and the other women I wrote about in my book, and now I’m looking at women philosophers from the tenth to the nineteenth century. There is a wealth of work by women philosophers out there. Reading their works has made philosophy come alive for me, all over again.
Anna Julia Cooper is one of the nineteen and twentieth American philosophers I find most exciting.
Her book, A Voice from the South, is the first feminist book to introduce the idea of intersectionality! She spent her very long lifetime writing about education, women’s rights, racism, and she has a fascinating correspondence with the intellectuals of her time, including W.E.B Dubois.
But until recently getting hold of her writings wasn’t terribly easy, unless you were willing to read online, or had access to a good academic library.
This beautiful and cheap edition is a godsend and everyone should buy it.
A collection of essential writings from the iconic foremother of Black intellectual history, feminism and activism
The Portable Anna Julia Cooper will introduce a new generation of readers to an educator, public intellectual and community activist whose prescient insights and eloquent prose underlie some of the most important developments in modern American intellectual thought and African-American social and political activism.
This volume brings together, for the first time, Anna Julia Cooper's major collection of essays, A Voice from the South, along with several previously unpublished poems, plays, journalism and selected correspondences, including over thirty previously unpublished letters between Anna Julia…
The Bridge provides a compassionate and well researched window into the worlds of linear and circular thinking. A core pattern to the inner workings of these two thinking styles is revealed, and most importantly, insight into how to cross the distance between them. Some fascinating features emerged such as, circular…
I have always loved cities, New York in particular. A few weeks after 9/11, I decided to study the rebuilding of the WTC site for my graduate thesis, compelled by the immensity of the project and the layers of conflict embedded in the reconstruction and memorialization. None of the books listed below are directly about 9/11, but the attacks and their aftermath thread through all of their stories. New York is an intense, fraught, sometimes fun, sometimes heartbreaking place, like these stories, which are listed from newest to oldest.
This essay collection isn’t exclusively about New York, but the four essays that open the collection are, and they are excellent. Biss writes personally about race relations in the city, and the United States. Her insights still feel relevant more than a decade later. She also refreshingly tackles the myth of New York, and the way that it is, as she says, overimagined.
A frank and fascinating exploration of race and racial identity, Notes from No Man's Land: American Essays begins with a series of lynchings and ends with a series of apologies. Eula Biss explores race in America and her response to the topic is informed by the experiences chronicled in these essays - teaching in a Harlem school on the morning of 9/11, reporting from an African American newspaper in San Diego, watching the aftermath of hurricane Katrina from a college town in Iowa, and settling in Chicago's most diverse neighbourhood.
As Biss moves across the country from New York to…
