Reviews tagging 'Slavery'

Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates

45 reviews

torturedreadersdept's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional informative reflective sad medium-paced

5.0


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dreadspawn's review

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challenging emotional reflective medium-paced

5.0


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meghan1111's review

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emotional informative reflective tense medium-paced

5.0


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gossamer_lens's review against another edition

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challenging emotional informative reflective medium-paced

5.0

Literally just amazing. Informative, emotional, profound and beautifully written. The book should speak for itself. The audiobook was 3 1/2 hours. At that length and with it's message everyone should read it. 

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keyradiator's review

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adventurous challenging dark informative inspiring reflective sad fast-paced

5.0

Absolutely breathtaking. Loved damn near every word in this book.

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sellnow_hannah's review against another edition

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challenging emotional reflective sad medium-paced

5.0

6/5 star

A truly beautiful, moving, and poignant memoir. This is written as a letter to the author’s son about life in a black body in the world of the Dreamers. I read this at the same time as I was listening to The New Jim Crow and this was a great combination. Between the World and Me puts a personal face on some of the themes explored in the more academic New Jim Crow.
Coates’ writing is incredible - almost poetic at many points. I was in awe of his skill and the beauty of his words (and now I want to read his articles for The Atlantic).
As a white, educated woman this book - more than any other I’ve read - made me look closely at my own privilege. While I can never fully understand the experience of living in a black body, this gave a raw, personal, emotional insight into the lives of people Coates describes as living in another galaxy than myself. 
I agree with the quote on the jacket, this absolutely should be required reading. This is a book to come back to again and again. 

(I don’t rate memoirs below a 4 star because I think it takes a lot of courage to be this vulnerable and share your life story. So for me 4-4.25 is good, 4.5-4.75 is great, 5.0 is fantastic.)

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sarahsbookstacks's review against another edition

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emotional hopeful reflective fast-paced

4.5


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readingelli's review

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challenging informative reflective medium-paced

5.0


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nnennaya_'s review

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adventurous challenging emotional hopeful informative inspiring reflective tense medium-paced

4.5


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audc's review

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challenging dark emotional informative reflective sad tense medium-paced

3.75

It was well penned and put into words the fear of being black. 
It’s informative of Coates’ experience and life as a black man in America which is packed with a lot of fear that then turns into anger. 
While I agree with the sentiment of Dreamers in America and a majority being white or wanting to be white (ie. having power and authority to inflict destruction), I do not agree with how inflated, fatalist, galactic, racism is portrayed. While it has become cultural and institutionalized -integrated- I do not agree with Coates’ fatalistic view. He ends with the struggle and more of a call for ‘fight for yourself’ instead of strive as a collective.
For this, this book transmits fear and morphs it into anger. As he doesn’t spend nearly as much time on the solution as describing the problem. I can understand where and how he got to his conclusion, but there is a danger in generalising. 


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