Reviews with content warning for Racism - The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness

Everyone should rest this book. It is a must read for all Americans to understand social justice issues today and what we need to do to achieve racial equality.

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scylla87's review against another edition

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challenging dark informative tense slow-paced

3.0

I really struggled with how to rate this book. From beginning to end it was a huge struggle for me. The author made some structural choices that often made it more difficult for me to keep up with what she was trying to impart. The basic tenements of what she was saying got through, but I feel like I need to go back and reread this before I can really form an opinion on what was contained within. That said, reading this book helped to change my perspective on a few things, especially the behavior of poor white people in relation to social programs. I intend to go back and read this one again when I have the time to really wrestle through it, as well as doing other reading on the topic of mass incarceration as well as other forms of institutionalized racism.

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spongebobbiii's review

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emotional informative reflective sad slow-paced

5.0

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coldcojones's review against another edition

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challenging informative reflective slow-paced

3.75

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quinnspired's review against another edition

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informative slow-paced

4.5

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zombiezami's review against another edition

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challenging dark informative sad medium-paced

4.0

I'm glad I finally got to read this after having it on my shelf for so long. It's an important political touchstone for a reason. Well reasoned and well researched. It's amazing how the impact of this book has been felt in the last few years, to the point where this book almost seems not to go far enough, since discussions of abolition are more mainstream. Still, very foundational.

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meganpbennett's review

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challenging dark informative inspiring reflective sad slow-paced

5.0

The New Jim Crow starts with an interesting premise, and explains it quite well. It focuses on Black men in America, specifically Black men who have been arrested, have served jail time, are currently incarcerated, or have been released on parole or similar. It also looks at how we got here, how we went from slavery to the War on Drugs.

The author acknowledges that this book has a very narrow focus, and I think that this narrow focus helps the book. While it would have been helpful and informative for there to have been sections on Hispanic men or Black women, keeping the focus on Black men emphasized how 'colorblind' politics really aren't, and how the modern day prison industrial complex had its roots in Slavery, Reconstruction, and Jim Crow.

It's a fascinating, if depressing, read about something that most people don't think about in modern day America - prisoners, parolees, those who have been arrested, those who have pled guilty, those who have to "check the box".

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