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3.96 AVERAGE
3.96 AVERAGE
informative
reflective
medium-paced
This is the first book I’ve heard where a white person truly understands the plight of Black people. It took him changing his skin to be in it. He took the “walk a mile in my shoes” to a whole other level of “sleeping in my skin”. I think honestly, this should be a book that all students should read in school. I found out about it by looking at the “Banned Book Week” website. I’ve never heard of this book before. It was a mindful read that everybody should read.
Excellent read. The book itself offers many insights into the race issues of that time but reading the epilogue can sound so similar of the problems today. It is sad to see that so much really hasn't changed.
Very powerful. Everyone should read this book.
Wonderful, heartbreaking. This is completely applicable to our times... which is so unfortunate. It’s been 60 years since Griffin experienced life as a black person. While reading, I got the distinct feeling that not much has changed.
There’s a passage near the end about black separatism and individualism. I do feel that my eyes were opened to the need for whites (well-meaning ones, no doubt) to stand back and give up some old ideas about living as one community, and everyone just getting along in love. We must follow blacks as they lead us to some new way of living and understanding.
Still, that passage was written in 1979. Progress is slow and pitiful.
There’s a passage near the end about black separatism and individualism. I do feel that my eyes were opened to the need for whites (well-meaning ones, no doubt) to stand back and give up some old ideas about living as one community, and everyone just getting along in love. We must follow blacks as they lead us to some new way of living and understanding.
Still, that passage was written in 1979. Progress is slow and pitiful.
Interesting. Insane idea. Remembered I read this after that one guy did the exact same thing a few months ago. He was crazy for this.
Meh. Maybe it's because I grew up in very different times, but I didn't buy how easy it was for Griffin to obtain his data...I can see the appeal of his story, I just had a hard time buying it. (Thankfully)
Self-Made Man: race edition - many of the same issues (but now including some new ones!), different context.
dark
emotional
informative
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
DNF
Only. Got about 2 minutes into the audiobook. I went into this book without knowing anything about it...I had just heard it raved about and it’s on basically all the anti-racist reading lists (I’m a bit confused why, maybe someone who’s read it can explain). I had no idea of the concept of this book until I started it. I am trying to learn a) how to be a better ally, b) how I unwittingly support and reinforce America’s foundation of white supremacy, and c) what the black American experience has been and is, and while this book may be a primer for those people whose views still line up with those of that time, I do not feel that listening to some guy whitesplain the hardships of living as a black man in the South, when he only did it for A COUPLE MONTHS, will help me toward my goals. There are so many messed up things about what he did (Including that, for it’s time, it was pretty radical) that other reviewers have mentioned. I will talk about what I feel is a more rare insight (at least I have not seen it):
HE ALWAYS KNEW THERE WAS AN ENDPOINT.
It reminds me of those well-intentioned, but completely insulting and pretty worthless, excercises of “be disabled for a day/hour/period.” As someone who is in a wheelchair I can say that, in my experience, the toughest part is knowing this is not a grit your teeth and get through it situation. Until you have to deal with the. Mental mindfuck of knowing the situation isn’t going to change you can’t truly understand what it’s like. Which is why I pretty much dismissed his experiment out of hand.
Only. Got about 2 minutes into the audiobook. I went into this book without knowing anything about it...I had just heard it raved about and it’s on basically all the anti-racist reading lists (I’m a bit confused why, maybe someone who’s read it can explain). I had no idea of the concept of this book until I started it. I am trying to learn a) how to be a better ally, b) how I unwittingly support and reinforce America’s foundation of white supremacy, and c) what the black American experience has been and is, and while this book may be a primer for those people whose views still line up with those of that time, I do not feel that listening to some guy whitesplain the hardships of living as a black man in the South, when he only did it for A COUPLE MONTHS, will help me toward my goals. There are so many messed up things about what he did (Including that, for it’s time, it was pretty radical) that other reviewers have mentioned. I will talk about what I feel is a more rare insight (at least I have not seen it):
HE ALWAYS KNEW THERE WAS AN ENDPOINT.
It reminds me of those well-intentioned, but completely insulting and pretty worthless, excercises of “be disabled for a day/hour/period.” As someone who is in a wheelchair I can say that, in my experience, the toughest part is knowing this is not a grit your teeth and get through it situation. Until you have to deal with the. Mental mindfuck of knowing the situation isn’t going to change you can’t truly understand what it’s like. Which is why I pretty much dismissed his experiment out of hand.