Reviews tagging 'Sexual assault'

The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story by Nikole Hannah-Jones

18 reviews

meganpbennett's review against another edition

challenging emotional informative reflective slow-paced

5.0

Started as a special edition in the the New York Times to commemorate the 400 year anniversary of the first African captives sold against their will as chattel slaves in Virginia, the 1619 Projects aims to be the framework for critical race theory, which looks at American history and adds back in the truths previously deemed unnecessary and to remove various beliefs about slavery. It's a devastating and necessary read. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Rape, Religious bigotry, Sexual assault, Sexism, Trafficking, Fire/Fire injury, Slavery, Vomit, Misogyny, Police brutality, Blood, Classism, Colonisation, Racism, Medical trauma, Gun violence, Death, Genocide, Gore, Hate crime, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Murder, Physical abuse, and Racial slurs

andsoitgoes's review against another edition

5.0

This is an excellent history of America. It's content and frame of reference are unique in the historical literature and it expertly fills a long-timeline black history void that has been missing from the core reading cannon for upper high school / lower college. If you are a history teacher looking for a sub section, or someone who doesn't want to read all in one go, each chapter is self contained and covers a timeframe from 1619 to modern day. The chapters are by topic. I recommend Race, Sugar, Citizenship, and Justice if you are looking for topics not often covered elsewhere.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Classism, Colonisation, Xenophobia, Violence, Racism, Sexual violence, Physical abuse, Slavery, Police brutality, Sexual assault, and Rape

Moderate: Kidnapping

kimveach's review against another edition

challenging emotional informative inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

4.5

A book blogger suggested that this is a great audiobook. I'm afraid I have to disagree. The authors read the essays; unfortunately, not all authors are great narrators. The performances of the poems would be the exception. After nearly falling asleep while driving the car, I decided to try reading it another way. Thankfully, Kindle had a sale that included both the written and audio versions of the book.

The essays are enlightening and contain the history I wish I had learned in school.

While there have been criticisms, I feel this New York Times response best describes the purpose of the book. "The very premise of The 1619 Project, in fact, is that many of the inequalities that continue to afflict the nation are a direct result of the unhealed wound created by 250 years of slavery and an additional century of second-class citizenship and white-supremacist terrorism inflicted on black people (together, those two periods account for 88 percent of our history since 1619). These inequalities were the starting point of our project — the facts that, to take just a few examples, black men are nearly six times as likely to wind up in prison as white men, or that black women are three times as likely to die in childbirth as white women, or that the median family wealth for white people is $171,000, compared with just $17,600 for black people. The rampant discrimination that black people continue to face across nearly every aspect of American life suggests that neither the framework of the Constitution nor the strenuous efforts of political leaders in the past and the present, both white and black, has yet been able to achieve the democratic ideals of the founding for all Americans."

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Genocide, Gore, Murder, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Slavery, Torture, Trafficking, Blood, Confinement, Deportation, Gun violence, Hate crime, Medical trauma, Forced institutionalization, Rape, Violence, Classism, Death, Injury/Injury detail, Racism, Death of parent, Grief, Police brutality, Racial slurs, and War

afreeby's review

challenging informative reflective fast-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Police brutality, Classism, Colonisation, Cultural appropriation, Hate crime, Sexual assault, Slavery, Murder, Sexism, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexual violence, Medical content, and Death

beccaruthe's review

challenging emotional informative inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Police brutality, Sexual assault, Death, Hate crime, Colonisation, Physical abuse, Racism, Rape, Racial slurs, Slavery, Torture, Violence, and Sexual violence

Minor: Abortion and Cultural appropriation

bandysbooks's review

challenging dark emotional informative reflective sad tense fast-paced

5.0

The history of America told from the perspective of Black historians. While the history itself wasn’t entirely new to me, the perspectives provided really challenged me to think about some of the misconceptions I held regarding the history of this nation. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gore, Gun violence, Hate crime, Colonisation, War, Grief, Sexual assault, Confinement, Death, Genocide, Trafficking, Injury/Injury detail, Abandonment, Emotional abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Gaslighting, Murder, Physical abuse, Police brutality, Forced institutionalization, Torture, Racial slurs, Classism, Medical trauma, Racism, Rape, Sexual violence, Slavery, and Violence

skitch41's review against another edition

challenging emotional hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad fast-paced

5.0

One of my favorite scenes in my favorite Indiana Jones movie, The Last Crusade, is the moment when Henry Jones, Sr., played by the legendary screen actor Sean Connery, is being slapped around by the Nazi colonel demanding to know where Jones’s Holy Grail Diary is. But when the colonel asks, “What does the diary tell you that it doesn’t tell us?”, Jones grabs the colonel’s hand before he can slap him again and says, “It tells me that goose-stepping morons life yourself should try reading books instead of burning them!” I bring that scene up in the context of this book review because, as of this writing, scores of “parent groups” across the United States are trying to force public schools and libraries to remove books about BIPOC and/or LGBTQ+ topics from their shelves. This particular book has been at the center of many of these efforts ever since the first articles of this project were published in The New York Times Magazine in August 2019. Having just finished this book, I have to say that it is one of the best books about American history that I have read in a long time. The authors and editors of this book make the best case for why Black Americans’s 400+ year freedom struggle should be at the center of how we tell the story of America, and, to paraphrase Henry Jones, Sr., people must read this book instead of trying to ban it.

For my full review, check out my blog here.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Slavery and Racism

Moderate: Racial slurs and Violence

Minor: Sexual violence and Sexual assault

deadeye's review against another edition

challenging informative reflective slow-paced

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Cultural appropriation, War, Torture, Slavery, Sexual violence, Sexual assault, Sexism, Rape, Racism, Racial slurs, Police brutality, Physical abuse, Murder, Misogyny, Mental illness, Medical trauma, Kidnapping, Hate crime, Gun violence, Genocide, Emotional abuse, Death, Colonisation, Classism, Confinement, Chronic illness, Child death, Child abuse, and Cancer