Stamped from the Beginning
The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America
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3.7 • 410 Ratings
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- $13.99
Publisher Description
The National Book Award winning history of how racist ideas were created, spread, and deeply rooted in American society.
Some Americans insist that we're living in a post-racial society. But racist thought is not just alive and well in America -- it is more sophisticated and more insidious than ever. And as award-winning historian Ibram X. Kendi argues, racist ideas have a long and lingering history, one in which nearly every great American thinker is complicit.
In this deeply researched and fast-moving narrative, Kendi chronicles the entire story of anti-black racist ideas and their staggering power over the course of American history. He uses the life stories of five major American intellectuals to drive this history: Puritan minister Cotton Mather, Thomas Jefferson, abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison, W.E.B. Du Bois, and legendary activist Angela Davis.
As Kendi shows, racist ideas did not arise from ignorance or hatred. They were created to justify and rationalize deeply entrenched discriminatory policies and the nation's racial inequities.
In shedding light on this history, Stamped from the Beginning offers us the tools we need to expose racist thinking. In the process, he gives us reason to hope.
APPLE BOOKS REVIEW
From the Puritans to the present, historian Ibram X. Kendi surveys centuries of racist ideas and policies in the United States. Kendi frames his narrative around five American intellectuals: slavery-endorsing preacher Cotton Mather, Thomas Jefferson, abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison, W. E. B. DuBois, and activist Angela Davis. The author uses these public figures’ words and actions to illuminate how racist thought contributes to hot-button issues like standardized tests and mass incarceration. A fascinating and urgent read, Stamped from the Beginning won the National Book Award for nonfiction the year after Ta-Nehisi Coates’ Between the World and Me took home the prize—and it’s just as essential for understanding racism’s impact on American life.
Customer Reviews
See AllIgnore the bad reviews
All the 1 stars are from angry White people
The One Star Reviews…
The brief and nonsensical one-star reviews demonstrate pretty effectively that their writers did not actually read this work.
If they had, it would have become very apparent that the author has no problem whatsoever with “white people,” but with racism and racist complacency. And if those reviewers can’t separate an entire race from those negative concepts, then perhaps their time would be better spent in self-reflection than in writing uninspired and factually inaccurate reviews based on fear-mongering nonsense.
“Stamped From the Beginning” does an excellent job at taking a historical look at the progression of racist and anti-racist ideas throughout the history of the United States. While certain sections might lean a little too far into their density and a metaphor or two (personally( fell flat, I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend this book to someone who would like to better understand the role of race and racist ideas throughout US history.
How sad
The one star reviews are so … sad, enraging. I’m white. Every word of this book just provided confirmation to what I have found researching our true history, what I’ve seen in my lifetime, what I continue to see. How anyone can argue we are a profoundly racist nation is exactly the proof needed. It’s in every atom of our society. Our judicial system, education system, healthcare system, work sector, real estate. We are STILL a slave society. Our Constitution drips with it. The second amendment so often repeated so little understood its true intention.
And yet, all some snowflakes got from this meticulously researched masterpiece is “how dare someone boo boo owie my sensitive feelings”. Want proof “the only thing wrong with black people is nothing, the only thing extraordinary about white people is … nothing”? Here it is. Sack up, fellow white people. The truth is our first step to real equality… or do you think you can’t compete without a fist on the scale? I dare you.