connwin 's review for:

5.0

Another required reading from Mr. Coates. It taught me a lot about the history of racism in this country. If you want to learn what someone means when they say that racism is not just prejudice; it's prejudice plus power or when they talk about white supremacy and the structural inequality it created, this book would be a good place to start.

It is not an easy read, both because it's longish and, even more so, because the material is often heavy. But like I said about the James Baldwin documentary I Am Not Your Negro: heavy but necessary.

WWEYIP is a collection of eight of the essays he wrote during the Obama years (with Obama himself figuring into some of them, though not all), including Coates' most well-known: The Case for Reparations and My President Was Black. Each essay is introduced by reflections on his life at the time he wrote it.