Reviews tagging 'Police brutality'

Minor Feelings: An Asian American Reckoning by Cathy Park Hong

5 reviews

bookcheshirecat's review against another edition

informative tense fast-paced

3.0

“Patiently educating a clueless white person about race is draining. It takes all your powers of persuasion. Because it’s more than a chat about race. It’s ontological. It’s like explaining to a person why you exist, or why you feel pain, or why your reality is distinct from their reality. Except it’s even trickier than that. Because the person has all of Western history, politics, literature, and mass culture on their side, proving that you don’t exist.” 

➽ This is a nonfiction about the Asian American identity! I was interested to learn more about the topic and in Minor Feelings the author offers a collection of essays filled with personal anecdotes. I liked the discussions about the model minority myth, the intersection between race/art and assimilation into American culture. While I liked hearing what Cathy Park had to say, I wish her essays had a bigger connection and that the book felt more cohesive. Some chapters were simply more intriguing to me than others. I struggled the most with the chapters that were focused on her personal life, as it felt a bit invasive and detracted from the points she wanted to make. At one point she talked in-depth about a complicated friendship and her friend's mental health issues. That didn't feel like it had a place in this book and I wonder if her friends consented to having very personal things shared for everyone to read about. The balance between personal anecdotes and her political discussions just felt a bit off at times and made this awkward to read. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Racism, Mental illness, Murder, Death, Genocide, and Violence

Moderate: Police brutality, Rape, Sexism, and Suicide attempt

Minor: Torture, War, Colonisation, and Schizophrenia/Psychosis

deetabz's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative reflective sad tense medium-paced

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Xenophobia, Blood, Emotional abuse, Misogyny, Murder, Violence, Rape, Racism, Racial slurs, Drug abuse, Drug use, Death, Hate crime, and War

Moderate: Colonisation, Police brutality, Bullying, Cultural appropriation, and Toxic friendship

noellelovesbooks's review against another edition

challenging dark informative medium-paced

4.0

This book gave me so much to think about. How little I know of history and the challenges that my ancestors have faced and continue to face. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Racial slurs, Sexual harassment, Ableism, Blood, Body shaming, Cancer, Classism, Colonisation, Cultural appropriation, Death, Emotional abuse, Genocide, Gore, Grief, Gun violence, Hate crime, Racism, Murder, Police brutality, Rape, Sexism, Slavery, Violence, and War

laurendenton's review against another edition

challenging emotional informative reflective medium-paced

3.75

I think that this is a difficult book for me to rate because of the fact that it is split into 7 different essays, some of which work in relation to others and some which stand completely alone. The first three essays, which spoke directly in regards to the title Minor Feelings, were extremely eye-opening and affirming to my past experiences with racism and sexism. I was able to, while reading those initial sections, come to the conclusion that the majority of my own racial experiences have been "minor feelings", meaning that they have been subtle and distorted by my own self-hating memory. I have not been pulled over or directly called the n-word, but I have had more indirect experiences that have made me, in retrospect, wonder if maybe I was overreacting the entire time. Similarly, my voicing of such events has been met with sharp dismissals that only further my personal disbelief. The following three essays for me were, to put it bluntly, unremarkable. As stand-alones, perhaps in a separate collection of essays or as their own works entirely, I would've found them to be exceptionally well-done. I was personally not able to make clear connections between these essays and the overall theme of the book and its title. Perhaps if they had been fitted in between the initial three essays, I would've been more appreciative of their content, but because I was so astonished initially, the second half of the book was rather underwhelming to me. The essay entitled "An Education", particularly, seemed out-of-place with the other essays, while "The Portrait of an Artist" was more connected to the idea of "Minor Feelings". Cathy Park Hong is, without a doubt, an incredible writer whose works I will eagerly indulge in in the future, but only half of these essays left me in utter shock at their precision and beauty. I have found this to be the case with another essay collection that I have read, and so it is hard to give a definite rating for a book that has ignited me just as much as it has left me unsatisfied. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Mental illness, Sexism, Classism, Misogyny, Murder, Rape, Racism, and Sexual assault

Moderate: Child death, Cultural appropriation, Alcohol, Body shaming, Child abuse, Colonisation, Death, Dementia, Domestic abuse, Drug use, Racial slurs, Suicide attempt, War, Eating disorder, Suicidal thoughts, and Toxic friendship

Minor: Pregnancy, Slavery, Addiction, Police brutality, Confinement, Fatphobia, Genocide, and Grief

alas_aly's review against another edition

challenging emotional informative reflective

4.5

I am not sure that I really know how to rate non-fiction since I just started reading it recently. I greatly appreciated this book. There was a lot in it that I really responded to. The history that she provided about Asians in the United States was enlightening. The discourse around looking sideways at your childhood. The concept of "minor feelings". The whole last chapter about being indebted v. being grateful. Even though it was difficult to hear about, her telling the story of the artist Theresa Hak Kyung Cha while also interrogating how we tell stories about Asian women was impactful. 
I often find that I relate to immigrant stories almost more than I do Black stories. There is something about explicitly being here because your parents thought that somewhere else was worse that i just so complicated. 
I would recommend that people read this if you are an in between person, neither white nor Black, or if you want insight into how that feels. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Police brutality, Racism, Rape, Sexism, and Xenophobia