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A review by ralovesbooks
My Time Among the Whites: Notes from an Unfinished Education by Jennine Capó Crucet
4.0
Recommended
I bought this book when the author's books were burned at a southern university after she had the gall to speak the truth about white privilege. I let WAY too much time pass before I read this excellent essay collection, but I'm glad I finally did. In 9 pieces, the author explores her experience as a first-generation college student, the impact of the Cuban community on politics, her family dynamics, and more. It's really well done and so thought-provoking, and now I need to read everything she's ever written. Recommended for fans of Jesmyn Ward, Audre Lorde, and Rebecca Solnit, as well as receptive learners who want more Latinx voices in their reading life.
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I tell readers that I see it as my job to tell stories that encourage people to act on their empathy - not just to feel something, as feeling is not enough, but to be moved to do something substantial with those feelings, some action that works to fix the systems that required the need for books like mine in the first place. (40, "Nothing is Impossible in America!")
The real truth is that people of color didn't create these problems [racial inequity], and we don't have magical solutions to them that we are keeping from you. We're in more vulnerable positions than you are. We need you to solve these problems because it is costing us our lives. You are part of these systems yet refuse to believe how immensely you benefit from them. Losing privilege can feel a lot like inequality. If something feels unfair to you as a white person, it's likely that equality is actually being achieved in that moment. (41, "Nothing is Impossible in America!")
I don't see the act of writing as a form of therapy, but I do think that what you write will reveal things you didn't consciously recognize as feelings you held, expose beliefs you didn't know you had. (191, "A Prognosis")
Writing fiction is my work, my form of artful avoidance that always inevitably leads me right back to the heart of the thing I am avoiding. (191, "A Prognosis")
I bought this book when the author's books were burned at a southern university after she had the gall to speak the truth about white privilege. I let WAY too much time pass before I read this excellent essay collection, but I'm glad I finally did. In 9 pieces, the author explores her experience as a first-generation college student, the impact of the Cuban community on politics, her family dynamics, and more. It's really well done and so thought-provoking, and now I need to read everything she's ever written. Recommended for fans of Jesmyn Ward, Audre Lorde, and Rebecca Solnit, as well as receptive learners who want more Latinx voices in their reading life.
---
I tell readers that I see it as my job to tell stories that encourage people to act on their empathy - not just to feel something, as feeling is not enough, but to be moved to do something substantial with those feelings, some action that works to fix the systems that required the need for books like mine in the first place. (40, "Nothing is Impossible in America!")
The real truth is that people of color didn't create these problems [racial inequity], and we don't have magical solutions to them that we are keeping from you. We're in more vulnerable positions than you are. We need you to solve these problems because it is costing us our lives. You are part of these systems yet refuse to believe how immensely you benefit from them. Losing privilege can feel a lot like inequality. If something feels unfair to you as a white person, it's likely that equality is actually being achieved in that moment. (41, "Nothing is Impossible in America!")
I don't see the act of writing as a form of therapy, but I do think that what you write will reveal things you didn't consciously recognize as feelings you held, expose beliefs you didn't know you had. (191, "A Prognosis")
Writing fiction is my work, my form of artful avoidance that always inevitably leads me right back to the heart of the thing I am avoiding. (191, "A Prognosis")